Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

“ Abner took his pipe out of his pocket, filled it and began to smoke. “It's easier for a man than a woman to be left,” he remarked, “because a man can smoke, always has that left.”
“That's the way I feel,” agreed Ed.
Abner stared around. “You've got everything shipshape.”
Ed nodded. “Jest the way she wanted.” He too stared about him, taking in everything completely with its fullest meaning of memory and loss. For a second he looked immensely grave. Then his gallant old face cleared. He laughed. “Yep,” he said, “this is some kitchen, and I cooked a supper anybody might have set down to. ”

“ Ed, seated in an old rocking chair, looked at Abby, seated in another.
“He used to smoke a pipe,” Abby said unexpectedly. She had put on an old brown silk dress. Her blond hair, gray on the top of her head, had a rosy tinge from the glowing isinglass door of the stove.
“I always have smoked a pipe,” said Ed.
“I like the smell of one,” said Abby. ”

“ Emmy's all the wife I want.”
“And my beau that died is all I ever want,” returned the woman with sudden understanding. She flushed with anger. “I never liked you enough to marry you, Ed Mann!”
“I don't suppose you did, but you can't live alone, poor little mite like you. You've got to have somebody with you to take care of you and keep you from freezing and starving to death.”
She turned her back toward him.
“Look at here, Abby, you don't like me well enough to marry me, and I married Emmy. That settled me about marrying. But — you ain't got anything against me?” ”

“ My God, Billy, if you knew how that poor little woman has slaved, and saved, and wanted, a home of her own all these years! She hated rentin'. ‘I ain't complainin', Ed,’ she'd say, ‘but I do feel if I could be livin' in a house that was our own, knowing I'd die in it when my time comes, it would mean more'n anything else to me.’ You see Emmy's folks did own their home. She never knew what it was to rent till she got married.”
“It ain't goin' to cost ye any less, Ed. Taxes goin' up every year. Renters goin' mad on town improvements. Lots of fun spendin' other folks' money. ”

“ Often that winter Ed sat of an evening in the kitchen, because of the cold, his stockinged feet toasting in the stove oven. He had his pipe and the evening paper. Sometimes he dozed lightly. Then he woke with a smile. He often talked aloud to himself.
“Emmy, she never could stand such dreadful cold,” he said, and nodded affirmatively. “She would have wanted to set in her parlor, and it's freezin' there. She would have worried about her plants and the bathroom pipes. Now she's where she don't have any call to suffer or worry. ”

“ Doctor Emmons hesitated a minute. “Insane people are different,” he admitted finally with a laugh, “but you are right, Miss Holmes. Different people are not always insane.”
“Well, he has always been different. I have known him all the years I have lived here. I am a little older. He was different as a boy. Take away Ed Mann's apple, and he would be just as happy with a nut. He was born with his face turned toward the bright side of things, and I really suppose everything in this life has its bright side. Ed's mental neck may seem a little askew to us, but he can't help it. ”

“ Everything which she wore had an appearance of having been worn in hot suns and heavy rains and wild winds, and being marvelously intact in spite of them. The woman herself, faded and old as she was, had a willowy grace and pliability which spelled strength. ”

“ Ed looked at Billy. There was a strange rapt expression in his blue eyes. “Be you sure?” he asked.
“You beat me, Ed.”
“Emmy, she planned every single thing. She picked out the paper. I know where every single piece of furniture is going to set. Do you s'pose a merciful God would make a good woman like Emmy lose every single thing she spent her life wishin' for because he called her unexpected to leave it?”
“I dunno. You beat me.”
“When I'm in that new house with everything jest the way Emmy wanted it, I'll feel as if she was there too.” ”

“ Billy said heavily.
Ed started, then he laughed. “That's just like you, Billy,” he said, “always lookin' on the dark side. Emmy, she's all right. She's had these spells before.”
“How many?”
“Oh I dunno, quite a lot. She always perks up right afterward. There's nothin' the matter with Emmy.”
The other man sat in a cloud of smoke. His face was inscrutable.
“Ain't you never had the doctor?”
“Doctor? Emmy would have had a fit if I had called in a doctor when we were savin' money for the house. Doctor! Hm! Emmy, she's all right. Ain't we goin' to play pinocle?” ”

“ Ed crammed his old pipe with tobacco. He lighted and smoked peacefully.
“Me and Billy Larkins always used to set evenings and smoke and play pinocle,” Ed remarked reflectively.
“I can play pinocle.”
“Like to?”
“Always did; don't play very well.”
The two sat at the little table and played pinocle. Ed won the first game. He looked across at Abby and smiled. “I guess if Emmy could look in here now, and see me setting here playing pinocle after that good supper, she's be tickled to death, after all I've gone through,” he said. ”

“ Here I be with money in my pocket, and quite a lot saved up in the bank, and a puppy dog, and a mother dog. Ain't never had a dog. Always wanted one.”
Back in the village the men were still anxiously poking the embers of Ed's garage for his charred bones, as he went up a glittering rise of road, the puppy under arm, the mother at heel.
Suddenly the following dog gave a short sharp yelp. Ed turned. The dog was a flat streak of speed on the road toward a slender advancing figure with fluttering fringed ends of shawls. ”

“ Ed had not been gone long before his garage crashed down with a burst of flame. It did not take much time to destroy the tiny edifice.
As soon as the embers were cool enough, men were poking in them. Everybody thought that Ed had perished in the fire. Doctor Emmons worked with the rest. Finally he got into his car and drove home to breakfast. ”

“ It is common nowadays and it is dangerous. It does not pay to go far on the road with the wrong sign, because you are sure it's right. Ed Mann denied the evil in life, and when mortal man denies evil he defies the gods. ”

“ Adeline said uncomfortably.
“You needn't be. Lots of folks have their houses burn down and don't have any other place to live in the way I do. I'm goin' to get some of the men to help me move in my things that are saved.”
Ed walked away. Adeline stood staring after him. Ed readily secured all the help he needed. They worked by the light of the smoldering house-fire. Soon the little garage was furnished and looked, after a fashion, comfortable.
When the people had all gone Ed stood gazing about him. There was a fire in the kitchen stove which had been saved. ”

“ Can't do everything till the last minute; the weather's so hot, the blooms would wilt.”
“I'll be over to-night.”
People talked a good deal about Ed Mann having his house finished and moving right in so soon after his best friend had died, and the more because he seemed radiantly happy. Ed, after he was settled in his new house, displayed it from attic to cellar to all callers. “It's all jest as my wife wanted it,” he would state triumphantly. “Ain't her room pretty? She always wanted a blue room. I know I ain't set a stick of furniture anywhere she wouldn't have picked out.” ”

“ There's been nothing but deaths in our family. Father died first, then I went out West to live with Sam and he married again. Then he died, and I lived with his second wife and my half-brother Harold.
“Sam's wife was a nice woman. She and I got along fine. Then she died, and Harold got married to a dreadful flighty little thing, pretty as a picture but dreadful flighty. Then Harold lost his job, and he thought he could get one round here, and the old house was here. So we moved. The furniture was mine. Father left it to me. We moved the furniture, and came on here in the summer.” ”

“ There was a smoothly made bed. The parlor rug was on the floor, curtains hung at the one window. There were chairs, a table, and a bureau with a looking-glass. There were dishes and cooking utensils and provisions.
“Come,” Ed said, “this is mighty nice after all. ”