“I will not kiss you again,” said Roger to himself, “until you promise to be my wife.”
That afternoon Roger asked Marion to drive to Meadow Centre.
“I am glad you did not ask Judith,” replied Marion, with something in her voice.
“Why not?” he asked, indignantly, “why shouldn’t I ask Judith to drive with me?”
“My point was not driving with you, but driving to Meadow Centre.”
“I knew you didn’t. Men are blind creatures.”
“Then open the eyes of one blind creature.”
“Haven’t you seen that Mr. King is interested in Judith?” she asked, somewhat impatiently.
“Not just as _he_ is. You are not,” looking straight into his frank, smiling eyes.
“What about _her_?” he asked with the color hot in his face. But Marion was a “blind creature” then and did not see.
“I don’t know about her. She isn’t grown up enough to think. But I know he is wonderfully attractive to her.”
“He’s a good fellow. I will not stand in his way.”
“For pity’s sake, Roger, don’t think you must do anything,” cried Marion, dismayed; “let her alone. He will take care of himself.”
“I shall certainly let her alone. He is so artless that he will be taken care of. It is like him to stumble into the best thing in the universe and then wonder how he ever got it.”
“I hope you don’t call Meadow Centre one of the best things,” retorted Marion.
“It’s a good place for a man to make something of himself; he is writing sermons that will make a stir somewhere. Meadow Centre is to him what Paul’s three years in Arabia were to him.”
“Then we must do our best to make Judith ready—”
“What a plotter you are,” he exclaimed, angrily; then, more quietly: “But we will make Judith ready,” and he walked off with a laugh that was a mixture of things.
This day, in which God’s daily bread and his daily will were given to Judith as upon all the other days, was one of the very happiest days of her happy life.
Roger’s kiss gave her an undefined sense of safety and protection; if she were not wise enough to decide when the time came she would take refuge in that safety and protection, and—another kiss.
That evening Joe came for her, saying Aunt Rody was worse. She went home with him, and “watched” with Aunt Affy, until poor Aunt Rody passed away from the home she had toiled so unceasingly for and taken so little comfort in. One week she stayed with Aunt Affy: “I miss her so,” wept Aunt Affy broken-heartedly; “I never was in the world without her before.”