“I will take you there myself and explain everything. And the moment I've lighted a fire in Mrs. Mason's best bedroom and settled you there, what do you think I am going to do? I shall drive to the town clerk's house, and if he is in bed, rout him out and have the notice of our intended marriage posted in a public place according to law. Perhaps I shall save a day out of the fourteen I've got to wait for my wife. 'Mills,' indeed! I wonder at you, Waitstill! As if Mrs. Mason's house was not far enough away, without your speaking of 'mills.'” “I only suggested mills in case you did not want to marry me,” said Waitstill. “Walk up to the door with me,” begged Ivory. “The horse is all harnessed, and Rod will slip him into the sleigh in a jiffy.” “Oh, Ivory! do you realize what this means?”--and Waitstill clung to his arm as they went up the lane together--“that whatever sorrow, whatever hardship comes to us, neither of us will ever have to bear it alone again?” “I believe I do realize it as few men could, for never in my five-and-twenty years have I had a human creature to whom I could pour myself out, in whom I could really confide, with whom I could take counsel. You can guess what it will be to have a comprehending woman at my side. Shall we tell my mother? Do say 'yes'; I believe she will understand.--Rod, Rod! come and see who's stepping in the door this very minute!” Rodman was up in his bedroom, attiring himself elaborately for sentry duty. His delight at seeing Waitstill was perhaps slightly tempered by the thought that flashed at once through his mind,--that if she was safe, he would not be required to stand guard in the snow for hours as he had hoped. But this grief passed when he fully realized what Waitstill's presence at the farm at this unaccustomed hour really meant. After he had been told, he hung about her like the child that he was,--though he had a bit of the hero in him, at bottom, too,--embracing her waist fondly, and bristling with wondering questions. “Is she really going to stay with us for always, Ivory?” he asked. “Every day and all the days; every night and all the nights. 'Praise God from whom all blessings flow!'” said Ivory, taking off his fur cap and opening the door of the living-room. “But we've got to wait for her a whole fortnight, Rod. Isn't that a ridiculous snail of a law?” “Patty didn't wait a fortnight.” “Patty never waited for anything,” Ivory responded with a smile; “but she had a good reason, and, alas! we haven't, or they'll say that we haven't. And I am very grateful to the same dear little Patty, for when she got herself a husband she found me a wife!” Rodman did not wholly understand this, but felt that there were many mysteries attending the love affairs of grown-up people that were too complicated for him to grasp; and it did not seem to be just the right moment for questions.