"I thought if I told you in time, you might get some word to him so he
could get away. The countersign is 'The Merchants of Boston.'"
Mrs. Hamlin's face suddenly changed its expression, and she answered
slowly, in a tone of intense, suppressed feeling:
"And so you left them gay gentlemen, and waded through the snow all
alone half a mile way out here, all in your pretty clothes, so that no
harm might come to my boy. God bless you, my child! God bless you with
his choicest blessings, my sweet young lady! My son does well to
worship the ground you walk on."
It was an odd sensation, but as the gray-haired woman was speaking,
her face aglow with tenderness, and her eyes wet with a mother's
gratitude, Desire could not help half wishing she had deserved the
words, even though that wish implied her being really in love with
this woman's son. It was not without emotion, and eyes to which a
responsive wetness had sprung that she exclaimed, with a gesture of
deprecation:
"No, no, do not thank me. If you knew all, you would not thank me. I
am not so good as you think," and, throwing the door open she sprang
out into the snow.
When she reentered the parlor at home, the silver-dialed clock, high
upon the wall, accused her of only an hour's absence, and since nobody
but herself knew that her feet were quite wet through, there were no
explanations to make.
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