“Yes,” she snapped, “there’s some people sick, and I guess there’ll be more of ’em a good deal sicker in the morning.  I’ve got to go.”

“A case of pizenin’?” asked the man very earnestly.

“Yes,” said she, wrapping her shawl around her; “the worse kind of pizenin’!” Then she talked no more.

The servant-girl slept late, and there were a good many ladies in the parlor when she came down.  She did not give them a chance to ask her anything, but told her message promptly.  It was a message pretty fairly remembered, although it had grown somewhat sharper in the night.  When it was finished the girl added:  “And I’m to have all the eatables in the house to take home to my mother, and Squire Allen is to pay me four dollars and seventy-five cents, which has been owin’ to me for wages for ever so long.”

CHAPTER XXXVI

Cold Tinder.

Olive and Dick Lancaster sat together in the captain’s parlor.  She was very quiet—­she had been very quiet of late—­but he was nervous.

“It is very kind, Mr. Lancaster,” said Olive, breaking the silence, “for you to come to see us instead of writing.  It is so much pleasanter for friends—­”

“Oh, it was not kind,” he said, interrupting her.  “In fact, it was selfishness.  And now I want to tell you quickly, Miss Asher, while I have the chance, the reason of my coming here to-day.  It was not to offer you my congratulations or my sympathy, although you must know that I feel for you and your uncle as much in every way as any living being can feel.  I came to offer my love.  I have loved you almost ever since I knew you as much as any man can love a woman, and whenever I have been with you I could hardly hold myself back from telling you.  But I was strong, and I did not speak, for I knew you did not love me.”

Olive was listening, looking steadily at him.

“No,” she said, “I did not love you.”

He paid no attention to this remark, as if it related to something which he knew all about, but went on, “I resolved to speak to you some time, but not until I had some little bit of a reason for supposing you would listen to me; but when I read the account of what you did in Washington, I knew you to be so far above even the girl I had supposed you to be; then my love came down upon me and carried me away.  And all that has since appeared in the papers has made me so long to stand by your side that I could not resist this longing, and I felt that no matter what happened, I must come and tell you all.”

“And now?” asked Olive.

“There is nothing more,” said Dick.  “I have told you all there is.  I love you so truly that it seems to me as if I had been born, as if I had lived, as if I had grown and had worked, simply that I might be able to come to you and say, I love you.  And now that I have told you this, I hope that I have not pained you.”

“You have not pained me,” said Olive, “but it is right that I should say to you that I do not love you.”  She said this very quietly and gently, but there was sadness in her tones.