Only, now she was asked this at the period when many women were returning to a second spinstership and one of her friends, who had married young and whose daughter had married young, was a grandmother. Deborah was experiencing the terror that assails young brides, the dread of the profoundest revolution in woman’s life. Only in her case the terror was the greater from the double duration of her maidenhood. She was still a girl, and yet gray was in her hair. The thought of marriage was almost intolerably fearful, and yet it was almost intolerably beautiful. How wonderful that she should be asked to marry the ideal of her youth–she, the laughing-stock of the other girls; and now she could have a husband, a home, and children of various ages, from the little tot to the grown-ups. She would never have babies of her own, she supposed, but she could acquire them ready-made. All her stifled domestic instincts flamed at the new empire offered her. And then she remembered Josie and Josie’s sneer: "Poor old Debby. She never was a rose." And now Josie was dead a year and more, and Josie’s children and Josie’s lover were submitted to her to take or leave. What a revenge it would be! What a squaring of old accounts! How she would turn the laugh back on them! How well she could laugh who waited to the last! Then she shook her head. What had she to do with revenge? What meaner advantage could anybody take than to flaunt a dead enemy’s colors? We can all deal sharply with our friends, but we must be magnanimous with our foes. No, it was impossible. Josie had suffered enough in the ebb of her beauty. Debby could not strike at her in her grave. CHAPTER IX She waited to announce her decision till Asaph should call again. Then till Asaph should call again. Then she told him what she had decided, but not why. He suspected every other reason except the truth. He was always a quick, hard fighter, and now Deborah had to endure what Josie had endured all her life. He denounced her, threatened her, cajoled her, pleaded with her, but Josie’s ghost chaperoned the two, forbade the banns, seemed to whisper, "His bad temper was what ruined my beauty." The next day in the store Asaph looked wretched. Deborah grew the more desirable for her denial. He had thought that he had but to ask her; and now she refused his beseeching. He paused before her counter and begged her to reconsider. He called at her home every evening. He went to her mother and implored her aid. The poor old soul could hardly believe her ears when she heard that Deborah was not only desired, but difficult. She promised Asaph that Deborah would yield, and he went away happy.