SWEETAPPLE COVE

BY GEORGE VAN SCHAIGK

1914




CHAPTER I

_From John Grant's Diary_


Have I shown wisdom or made an arrant, egregious fool of myself? This, I
suppose, is a question every man puts to himself after taking a sudden
decision upon which a great deal depends.

I have shaken the dust of the great city by the Hudson and forsaken its
rich laboratories, its vast hospitals, the earnest workers who were
beginning to show some slight interest in me. It was done not after
mature consideration but owing to the whim of a moment, to a sudden
desire to change the trend of things I felt I could no longer contend
with.

Now I live in a little house, among people who speak with an accent that
has become unfamiliar to the great outside world. They have given up
their two best rooms to me, at a rental so small that I am somewhat
ashamed to tender it, at the end of every week. I also obtain the
constant care and the pleasant smiles of a good old housewife who appears