Page:Wiggin--Ladies-in-waiting.djvu/138

  must try her hand at improving the immediate situation.

Stealing downstairs she tied on her apron and lighted a fire in the kitchen stove, with the view of making things respectable before gossipy neighbors came in. Her sister used to say that the minute Amanda tied on her apron things began to move and take a turn for the better, and it was so now. She poured a few drops of cologne into a basin of water, and putting the towel over her arm went upstairs to Caleb’s bedside.

“I’ve done him wrong,” she thought remorsefully as she noted his decent night-clothing and bedding. “He ain’t lost his self-respect in all these years, and every soul in Bonny Eagle thought he was living like an animal!”

She bathed his face and throat and hands, then moistened and smoothed his hair without provoking a movement or a sound. He seemed in a profound stupor, but there was no stertorous breathing. Straightening the bedclothes and giving a hasty wipe to the