"If you could smoke a clay pipe 't would calm your nerves, mother, an' help
you to git some philosophy inter you; you need a little philosophy turrible
bad."

"I need patience consid'able more," was Mrs. Wiley's withering retort.

"That's the way with folks," said Old Kennebec reflectively, as he went on
peacefully puffing. "If you try to indoose 'em to take an int'rest in a
bran'-new virtue, they won't look at it; but they 'll run down a side street
an' buy half a yard more o' some turrible old shop-worn trait o' character
that they've kep' in stock all their lives, an' that everybody's sick to death
of. There was a man in Gard'ner--"

But alas! the experiences of the Gardiner man, though told in the same
delightful fashion that had won Mrs. Wiley's heart many years before, now fell
upon the empty air. In these years of Old Kennebec's "anecdotage," his pipe
was his best listener and his truest confidant.

Mr. Wiley's constant intercessions with his wife made Rose's home-coming
somewhat easier, and the sight of her own room and belongings soothed her
troubled spirit, but the days went on, and nothing happened to change the
situation. She had lost a lover, that was all, and there were plenty more to
choose from, or there always had been; but the only one she wanted was the one
who made no sign. She used to think that she could twist Stephen around her
little finger; that she had only to beckon to him and he would follow her to
the ends of the earth. Now fear had entered her heart. She no longer felt
sure, because she no longer felt worthy, of him, and feeling both uncertainty
and unworthiness, her lips were sealed and she was rendered incapable of
making any bid for forgiveness.