"No, Alida," he said quietly, obeying a subtle impulse. "I'd rather you would
do everything your own way--as it's natural for you. There, we've talked so
long that it's too late to feed the chickens tonight. You can begin in the
morning."

"Oh!" she cried, "and you have all your other work to do. I've hindered
rather than helped you by coming out."

"No," he replied decidedly, "you've helped me. I'll be in before very long."

She returned to the house and busied herself in preparations for supper. She
was very thoughtful, and at last concluded: "Yes, he is right. I understand.
Although I may do WHAT his wife did, he don't wish me to do it AS she did.
There could only be a partial and painful resemblance to his eyes. Both he
and I would suffer in comparisons, and he be continually reminded of his loss.
She was his wife in reality, and all relating to her is something sacred and
past to him. The less I am like her, the better. He married me for the sake
of his farm, and I can best satisfy him by carrying out his purpose in my own
way. He's through with sentiment and has taken the kindest way he could to
tell me that I've nothing to do with his past. He feared, yes, he FEARED, I
should forget our businesslike agreement! I didn't know I had given him cause
to fear; I certainly won't hereafter!" and the wife felt, with a trace of
bitterness and shame, that she had been put on her guard; that her husband had
wished to remind her that she must not forget his motive in marrying her, or
expect anything not in consonance with that motive. Perhaps she had been too
wifelike in her manner, and therefore he had feared. She was as sensitive to
such a reproach as she would have been in her girlhood.

For once her intuition was at fault, and she misjudged Holcroft in some