“Will this mean the end of the fighting, do you think?” asked Clotilde. “They are saying in the village that King George will see now that there is no hope for him.”
“Bless you, my child,” answered Stephen, “this is the first time, probably, that His Majesty, King George the Third has fully realised that the war has begun.”
They sat there for some time in the falling darkness, both busy with their own thoughts. Finally Stephen, with a visible effort, spoke again.
“There is a rich merchant in Boston, Clotilde, who desires to—to buy the lower half of our garden, that strip of land that goes down to the water’s edge.”
“Oh, no,” exclaimed the startled girl. “Surely you would never sell it! Is it not enough that the trees and flowers are gone, must we also lose the land itself? What can a man in far-off Boston want with our garden? Oh, how can you speak of such a thing?”
“He offers what he calls a good price,” pursued Stephen steadily. “He does not know, poor stupid fellow, that all the wealth in the world could never repay us for the loss of what once belonged to Master Simon.”
“Then you will not part with it?” she asked hopefully.
“There are times,” he said at last; “times like these, when even that which one would not sell for all the gold on earth must be freely given. What Master Simon left to us seems well-nigh sacred, but the welfare of our neighbours, is not that sacred too? People are suffering, some are starving, and with every year that the war drags on the poverty grows worse. My own fortune has been swept away by the hazards of the time; a moment is very close when people will come to me for help and I will have naught to give them. Shall a strip of meadow land, a blossoming hedge and a memory of Master Simon be more to us than our love for our people?”
“No,” agreed Clotilde, but with a sob; “no, you are right and he would never have wished us to keep it. But oh, the very thought of it breaks my heart!”
On Stephen’s next journey to Boston the transfer was made and a good half of Master Simon’s garden passed into the hands of Ephraim Paddock, the wealthiest and most close-fisted man in all of Massachusetts. Having in view the building of docks and warehouses at the water’s edge, a plan that could not well be carried out at once, he graciously granted, as part of the terms of sale, permission that Stephen Sheffield make use of the land until building should begin. Therefore the meadow still yielded its harvest for the feeding of the poor, while its purchase price was spread broadcast to give clothing and shelter to those who were in need.