"Oh, Mr. Erle, is it you, or your ghostie?" she cried, as she fell
against the door of the brick oven. "Do 'e speak, for God's sake, if He
have given the power to 'e."
"He has almost taken it away again, so far as the English language
goes," Erle Twemlow answered, with a smile which was visible only in his
eyes, through long want of a razor; "but I am picking up a little.
Shake hands, Kezia, and then you will know me. Though I have not quite
recovered that art as yet."
"Oh, Mr. Erle!" exclaimed Zebedee's wife, with tears ready to start for
his sake and her own, "how many a time I've had you on my knees, afore
I was blessed with any of my own, and a bad sort of blessing the best of
'em proves. Not that I would listen to a word again' him. I suppose you
never did happen to run again' my Dan'el, in any of they furrin parts,
from the way they makes the hair grow. I did hear tell of him over to
Pebbleridge; but not likely, so nigh to his own mother, and never come
no nigher. And if they furrin parts puts on the hair so heavily, who
could 'a known him to Pebbleridge? They never was like we be. They'd as
lief tell a lie as look at you, over there."
In spite of his own long years of trouble, or perhaps by reason of them,
Erle Twemlow, eager as he was to get on, listened to the sad tale that
sought for his advice, and departed from wisdom--as good-nature always
does--by offering useless counsel--counsel that could not be taken, and
yet was far from being worthless, because it stirred anew the fount of
hope, towards which the parched affections creep.
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