Susan Hornby's home was so unchanged in the year that Elizabeth had been gone that, but for the baby in her arms, she could hardly have realized that she had been away. Aunt Susan sent her to the bedroom with the wraps when they were taken off. It was the same little room the girl had occupied for half that year, the same rag carpet, the same mended rocking chair which had come to grief in the cyclone, and the knitted tidy which the girl herself had made. With the hot tears running down her cheeks the girl-mother threw herself upon the bed and buried her face in the baby's wraps to stifle the cry she was afraid would escape her. In the sanctuary of her girlhood's highest hopes, Elizabeth sobbed out her disappointments and acknowledged to herself that life had tricked her into a sorry network of doubts and unsettled mysteries. For the first time she sunk her pride and let Susan think what she would of her prolonged absence, and went openly to the kitchen to bathe her face in Nathan's familiar tin basin. A sudden suspicion of John's reception at Nathan's hands made it possible to go back to Aunt Susan with a smile on her lips. Indeed, Elizabeth's suspicions were so far true that they were a certainty. Nathan, by Luther's marriage to a woman the old man suspected of every evil, had cut himself off from every friend. Nathan had been thrown in upon himself and had pondered and nursed his suspicions of all men, and of John Hunter in particular. He finished the milking without offering to go into the house; and John, who had insisted upon coming at night instead of on a Sunday, was obliged to stand around the cow stable and wait, or go to the house alone. He chose the former course and was made happy by the arrival of Jake, who had not known where his employer was going when his team was hitched to the wagon. "I've just been over to Luther's, Mrs. Hornby," Jake said when they finally stood around Aunt Susan's fire. "Did you know Sadie was sick? Luther's awful good to 'er, but I know she'd be glad t' see a woman body about once in a while." "Wisht she'd die an' get out of th' way," Nathan Hornby said bitterly. "A body could see Luther once in a while then 'thout havin' 'is words cut up an' pasted together some new way for passin' round." No one spoke, and Nathan felt called upon to defend his words. "I don't care! It's a God's pity t' have a woman like that carry off th' best man this country's ever had, an' then fix up every word 'is friends says t' him so's t' make trouble." Nathan's whole bitter longing for companionship was laid bare. Elizabeth's eyes filled with tears; Elizabeth was lonely also.