John D. Swain

“ And how he seemed to relish his last meal! Do you remember what pains I took to have that steak done just as he always liked it?”
“And how nicely I browned the potatoes?”
“Poor Elmer! He was a great sufferer at the last. Do you think, Hetty, that he was resigned? That his soul has gone to—that it is—”
“I don't have to decide that. God is just, and will make allowances. You know mother, when she took to her bed for the last time, told us always to be tender to Elmer. 'He ain't quite all there!' were her very words. He won't be judged like other men who have all their faculties.” ”

“ When he had finished, he unfastened the pantry window and threw it wide. He scattered some crumbs upon the sill, dropped half a doughnut and a boiled potato outside. It might be that they would not believe some tramp had ravaged their stores—but at least he'd fix it so they never could disprove it! He blew out his candle, and, bundle in hand, began his return trip.
There was no trouble crossing the kitchen. There was even less in going up the stairs in the dark than in coming down. But Elmer had been away from home for years. ”

“ For a little while they sat about the big kerosene lamp, and after Nancy had clumped up-stairs to bed—it had been her weekly ironing day—the sisters lingered a few minutes longer. Letty dampened another cambric handkerchief—her third that day—and sniffed genteelly.
“I—I'm afraid its impious! We're wicked old women, Hetty!” ”

“ That is why, when I feel tired, and like sort of scraping something together most anyhow, I always say to myself: 'this may be the last meal I shall ever get!' And how sorry I should be if I hadn't taken pains with it.”
“You wouldn't know,” commented the practical Elmer between two mouthfuls of fried potato. “Not if I understand what you're driving at.”
Letty sighed.
“How wise a provision it is that we don't even know! We should be miserable all the time; for of course there'd be a last time for everything else, too ”

“ Instead of thinking of them, his mind ran back to Elmer, the brother who had returned to the old Pritchett place the previous fall, after years of wandering. It would not be strictly accurate to call him the black sheep of the family; white elephant is much the better term. A husky man of fifty, Jack of all trades, he could readily get a job in any town or city ”

“ There may have been a few more; it was hard to count them accurately next day.
All things must have an end. He found himself in the hall a few years later, as it seemed, and still later, in his own bed.
Letty crept chattering into Hetty's room, and spent the remainder of the night with her. From Nancy's room not another sound came. The incident was closed, in her opinion. She went to sleep again. No one else did, save for brief cat naps.
Very early next morning Letty rose and peered out of the window. The east was aflame, turning the snow a faint rose color. ”

“ The middle-aged man who sat between the two sisters in the front parlor, knew all there was knowable about their family connections, physiques, religious views, dispositions, financial condition, ability as housekeepers, and what they read. ”

“ Next to it was Nancy Hines's. Nearest the stairs, an empty one, facing another across the hall, the other two being used by Hetty and Letty.
A journey in the dark always seems longer than in the light. To Elmer, inching along the hall in pitch blackness, it seemed that he must have gone even farther than his door ”

“ He believed in powerful and devastating drugs when medicine was indicated—loved to see results; but his experience had enriched him with a fund of practical psychology based on a profound. if circumscribed knowledge of human nature—in and around Pepperill. With characteristic energy, no sooner did the great idea come into being than he proceeded to put it in operation. ”