“Her back was to him and he hadn’t any idea she was there, so when she turned round, they stared at each other for just a minute, as if they’d never seen each other. Now the moment had come, Margaret stood there frozen, just waiting, like a little scared, helpless--I had the half of me hanging out the kitchen window to see what would happen, and I’ll never forget it--never--never--never--the look on his face, the astounded look on his face, so full of pity and love, so strong with pity and love. ‘Margie! _Margie!_’ he said in a loud voice, and threw his sack off his back and his gun from his hand, and ran, ran to take her in his arms. “Well, when I could see again, I went off to tell old Mrs. Canfield, and there was the old lady in her own bedroom, standing bolt upright in the middle of the floor, and crying at the top of her voice. Her wrinkled old face was just a-sop with tears. Faith, but it was the grand cry she was having! And the good it did her! When she came to, she says to me, ‘Well,’ says she, ‘folks aren’t so cussed as they seem, are they?’ “And then we went downstairs to get out the fruit-cake and the brandied peaches; for the minister married them in our parlor that afternoon.” One day old Mr. Morgan, the one-armed Civil War veteran, took me along with him, to get out of the buckboard and open gates, on the back road along the river. He was going up to a hill pasture to salt his sheep. It took forever to get there, because his horse was so slow, and he had time to tell me a great many stories. This was one of them: “When I was a boy at school, I worked at Aunt Almera Canfield’s doing chores night and morning. I remember how she used to loosen herself up in the morning. She was terribly rheumaticky, but she wouldn’t give in to it. Every morning she’d be all stiffened up so she couldn’t stand up straight, nor hardly move her legs at all; but she’d get herself dressed somehow, and then two of her sons came in to help her get started. She’d make them take hold of her, one on each side, and walk her around the room. It was awful to hear how she’d yell out--yell as though they were killing her! And then they’d stop, the sweat on their faces to see how it hurt her, and then she’d yell at them to go on, go on, _she_ hadn’t asked them to stop! They were over sixty, both of them, with grandchildren themselves, but they didn’t dare not do what she said, and they’d walk her round again. She’d kick her poor legs out in front of her hard, to get the joints limbered up, and holler with the pain, and kick them out again, till by and by she’d get so she could go by herself, and she’d be all right for the day. I tell you, I often think of that. Yes, lots of times, it comes back to me.”