And now her voice was full and peaceful, and when the dog came begging she fed him well and recklessly, and the beast ate happy and amazed, gulping all down in haste and sighing in content when he was full and fed.
That night she slept. They all slept and sleep covered them all, mother and children, deep and full of rest.
XII
The next day came gray and still with unfinished rain of summer and the sky pressed low over the valley heavy with its burden of the rain, and the hills were hidden. But the mother rose early and made ready to take the girl to the town. She could not wait a day more to do what she could for this child of hers. She had waited all these many days and even let them stretch out into years, but now in her new motherhood, washed clean by tears, she could not be too tender or too quick for her own heart.
As for the young girl, she trembled with excitement while she combed her long hair and braided it freshly with a pink cord, and she put on a clean blue coat flowered with white, for she never in all her life had been away from this small hamlet, and as she made ready she said wistfully to them all, “I wish my eyes were clear today so I could see the strange sights in the town.”
But the younger lad, hearing this, answered sharply and cleverly, “Yes, but if your eyes were clear you would not need to go.”
So apt an answer was it that the young girl smiled as she ever did at some quick thing he said, but she answered nothing, for she was not quick herself but slow and gentle in all she did, and when she had thought a while she said, “Even so, I had rather have my eyes clear and never see the town, perhaps. I think I would rather have my eyes clear.”
But she said this so long after that the lad had forgotten what he said, being impatient in his temper and swift to change from this to that in play or bits of tasks he did, and indeed, he was more like his father than was any of the three.
But the mother did not listen to the children’s talk. She made ready and she clothed herself. Once she stood hesitating by a drawer she opened and she took a little packet out and looked at it, opening the soft paper that enwrapped it, and it was the trinkets, and she thought, “Shall I keep them or shall I turn them into coin again?” And she doubted a while and now she thought, “True it is I can never wear them again, being held a widow, nor could I bear to wear them anyhow. But I could keep them for the girl’s wedding.” So she mused staring down at them in her hand. But suddenly remembering, her gorge rose against them and she longed to be free from them and from every memory and she said suddenly with resolve, “No, keep them I will not. And he might come home—my man might come home, and if he found me with strange trinkets he would not believe me if I told him I had bought them myself.” So she thrust the packet in her bosom and called to the girl they must set forth.
They went along the country road and through the hamlet before there was a stir, it was so early. The mother strode freely, strong again as she had not been for long, her head high and free against the misty air, and she led her daughter by the hand, and the girl struggled to move quickly, too. But she had not known how little she could see. About the well known ways of home her feet went easily and surely enough and she did not know she went by feel and scent and not by sight, but here the road was strange to her, now high, now low, for the stones were sunken sometimes, and often she would have fallen had it not been for her mother’s hand.
Then the mother seeing this was frightened and her heart ran ahead to meet this fresh evil and she cried out afraid, “I doubt I have brought you too late, poor child. But you never told me that you could not see and I thought it was but the water in your eyes that kept you blinded.”
And the girl half sobbing answered, “I thought I saw well enough, too, my mother, and I think I do, only this road is so up and down, and you go more quickly than I am used to go.”
Then the mother slowed her steps and said no more and they went on, more slowly, save that when they came near to that shop of medicine the mother made haste again without knowing that she did, she was so eager. It was still early in the day and they were the first buyers and the medicine seller was but taking down the boards from his shop doors, and he did it slowly, stopping often to yawn and thrust his fingers into his long and uncombed hair and scratch his head. When he looked up and saw this countrywoman and the girl standing there before his counter he was amazed and he cried out, “What is it you want at such an early hour?”
Then the mother pointed to her child and she said, “Is there any balm that you have for such eyes as these?”
The man stared at the girl then
