Christian fiction; City and town life -- Fiction; Clergy -- Fiction; Ozark Mountains -- Fiction
"I can't, Doctor. Mrs. Oldham, I can't--" The girl was right. The Doctor
was never so ashamed in all his life. After a little, he said with
decision, "Look here, Grace, you sit down on the porch for a few minutes.
Martha is in bed and fast asleep long ago." He stole away as quietly as
possible, and in a little while returned with a basket full of such
provisions as he could find in the pantry. He was chuckling to himself as
he thought of Martha when she discovered the theft in the morning, and
cursing half aloud the thing that made it necessary for him to steal from
his own pantry for the girl whom he would have taken into his home so
gladly, if--
He made her eat some of the cold chicken and bread and drink a glass of
milk. And when she was feeling better, walked with her down the street a
little way, to be sure that she was all right.
"I can't thank you enough, Doctor," she said, "you have saved me from--"
"Don't try," he broke in. He did not want her to get on that line again.
"Go on home like a good girl now, and mind you look carefully in the
bottom of that basket." He had put a little bill there, the only money
he had in the house. "This will help until times are better for you, and
mind now, if you run against it again, come to me or go to Dr. Harry at
the office, and tell him that you want me."
He watched her down the street and then went home, stopping for a word
of explanation to Deborah and Denny, who were waiting at the gate.
The light was still burning in Dan's window when the Doctor again entered
his own yard. He thought once that he would run in on the minister for a
minute, and then remembered that "the boy would be tired after his great
effort defending the faith of Memorial Church." It was long past the old
man's bed time. He told himself that he was an old fool to be prowling
about so late at night, and that he would hear from Martha all right
tomorrow. Then, as he climbed into bed, he chuckled again, thinking of
the empty kitchen pantry and that missing basket.
The light in Dan's room went out. Some belated person passed, going home
for the night; a little later, another. Then a man and woman, walking
closely, talking in low tones, strolled slowly by in the shadow of the
big trees. The quick step of a horse and the sound of buggy-wheels came
swiftly nearer and nearer, passed and died away in the stillness. It was
Dr. Harry answering a call. In Judge Strong's big, brown house, a nurse
in her uniform of blue and white, by the dim light of a night-lamp,
leaned over her patient with a glass of water. In Old Town a young woman
in shabby dress, with a basket on her arm, hurried--trembling and
frightened--across the lonely, grass-grown square. Under the quiet stars
in the soft moonlight, the cast-iron monument stood--grim and cold and
sinister. In the peace and quiet of the night, Denny's garden wrought
its mystery. In the little room that looked out upon the monument and
the garden, Dan--all unknowing--slept.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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