The Country of the Pointed Firs Sarah Orne Jewett (bill gates best books TXT) đ
- Author: Sarah Orne Jewett
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The old widower sat with his head bowed over his knitting, as if he were hastily shortening the very thread of time. The minutes went slowly by. He stopped his work and clasped his hands firmly together. I saw he had forgotten his guest, and I kept the afternoon watch with him. At last he looked up as if but a moment had passed of his continual loneliness.
âYes, maâam, Iâm one that has seen trouble,â he said, and began to knit again.
The visible tribute of his careful housekeeping, and the clean bright room which had once enshrined his wife, and now enshrined her memory, was very moving to me; he had no thought for anyone else or for any other place. I began to see her myself in her homeâ âa delicate-looking, faded little woman, who leaned upon his rough strength and affectionate heart, who was always watching for his boat out of this very window, and who always opened the door and welcomed him when he came home.
âI used to laugh at her, poor dear,â said Elijah, as if he read my thought. âI used to make light of her timid notions. She used to be fearful when I was out in bad weather or baffled about gittinâ ashore. She used to say the time seemed long to her, but Iâve found out all about it now. I used to be dreadful thoughtless when I was a young man and the fish was bitinâ well. Iâd stay out late some oâ them days, anâ I expect sheâd watch anâ watch anâ lose heart a-waitinâ. My heart alive! what a supper sheâd git, anâ be right there watchinâ from the door, with somethinâ over her head if âtwas cold, waitinâ to hear all about it as I come up the field. Lord, how I think oâ all them little things!â
âThis was what she called the best room; in this way,â he said presently, laying his knitting on the table, and leading the way across the front entry and unlocking a door, which he threw open with an air of pride. The best room seemed to me a much sadder and more empty place than the kitchen; its conventionalities lacked the simple perfection of the humbler room and failed on the side of poor ambition; it was only when one remembered what patient saving, and what high respect for society in the abstract go to such furnishing that the little parlor was interesting at all. I could imagine the great day of certain purchases, the bewildering shops of the next large town, the aspiring anxious woman, the clumsy sea-tanned man in his best clothes, so eager to be pleased, but at ease only when they were safe back in the sailboat again, going down the bay with their precious freight, the hoarded money all spent and nothing to think of but tiller and sail. I looked at the unworn carpet, the glass vases on the mantelpiece with their prim bunches of bleached swamp grass and dusty marsh rosemary, and I could read the history of Mrs. Tilleyâs best room from its very beginning.
âYou see for yourself what beautiful rugs she could make; now Iâm going to show you her best tea things she thought so much of,â said the master of the house, opening the door of a shallow cupboard. âThatâs real chiny, all of it on those two shelves,â he told me proudly. âI bought it all myself, when we was first married, in the port of Bordeaux. There never was one single piece of it broke untilâ âWell, I used to say, long as she lived, there never was a piece broke, but long at the last I noticed sheâd look kind oâ distressed, anâ I thought âtwas âcount oâ me boastinâ. When they asked if they should use it when the folks was here to supper, time oâ her funeral, I knew sheâd want to have everything nice, and I said âcertain.â Some oâ the women they come runninâ to me anâ called me, while they was takinâ of the chiny down, anâ showed me there was one oâ the cups broke anâ the pieces wropped in paper and pushed way back here, corner oâ the shelf. They didnât want me to go anâ think they done it. Poor dear! I had to put right out oâ the house when I see that. I knowed in one minute how âtwas. Weâd got so used to sayinâ âtwas all there justâs I fetched it home, anâ so when she broke that cup somehow or ânother she couldnât frame no words to come anâ tell me. She couldnât think âtwould vex me, âtwas her own hurt pride. I guess there waânât no other secret ever lay between us.â
The French cups with their gay sprigs of pink and blue, the best tumblers, an old flowered bowl and tea caddy, and a japanned waiter or two adorned the shelves. These, with a few daguerreotypes in a little square pile, had the closet to themselves, and I was conscious of much pleasure in seeing them. One is shown over many a house in these days where the interest may be more complex, but not more definite.
âThose were her best things, poor dear,â said Elijah as he locked the door again. âShe told me that last summer before she was taken away that she couldnât think oâ anything more she wanted, there was everything in the house, anâ all her rooms was furnished pretty. I was goinâ over to the Port, anâ inquired for errands. I used to ask her to say what she wanted, cost
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