Besides, there was the delicate touch of another hand, as fine, as soft as a woman's and yet almost as strong as the farmer's, in her mind, a hand whiter than her own, though somewhat freckled, a hand that had taper fingers and well-kept nails, a hand that bore an antique seal ring and a fine pearl, a hand alas that had often retained her own in its warm clinging pressure, and once--only once, and that was three years ago--clasped her unresisting waist for a moment in the dark under the Oak while her sister fumbled at the gate. And just as she cherished these memories of Mr. Joseph, so did the widowed farmer retain the few occasions in his mind on which he had met Miss Dexter, spoken with her, given her a "lift" into town or up the road to the village store, for this was not the first use she had made of his gallant good nature and the Kentucky team.
He looked down at her now as they drove along in silence and noticed her thin black gown, her short jacket, her bit of black veil drawn over her bonnet, and her dingy travelling-bag with its tarnished clasp, and he heaved a sigh.
Charlotte was a "sizeable woman" thought Farmer Wise "and wants a good live garment sometimes, to bring her figure out and make more of it and do justice to it. A shawl now! How much would a good shawl be? I miss a woman round the place; I wouldn't know what to ask for. I might ha' stopped nigh the Inn and asked Mrs. Cox." Ay, you might Farmer Wise, and have done another mischievous thing, upsetting Mrs. Cox for a week as she waited for a parcel from town and breaking her heart altogether as day after day followed and no parcel arrived.
"I ha' never seen the ekil of those Mr. Foxleys yonder," began the honest farmer as something to start a conversation with. "I ha' never seen their ekil."
"Oh!" said Miss Dexter. "Yes? In what way?"
"So gentle and so funny as they be. Gentlemen both of them with delicate hands and fine clothes--"
"Yes, yes," murmured Miss Dexter under her breath, clutching at her bag and closing her eyes.
"And not above anybody or anything going. I see the pale one this day, and pale he is and weak they say, enough to be walked about on the girl's shoulder--I see him to-day as I passed the Inn, he was on a long chair out in the bit of paved yard, you know Miss Dexter, and when he saw me he raises his head and says 'Farmer Wise, is that you?'" May be you don't remember just how he speaks. He speaks better now nor when he came, and his brother too. At first It was all in a jumble like one word run into the other and hard to understand at least for us country folks. But now 'tis a bit clearer, more as you speak, begging your pardon, Miss Dexter, for noticing that or anything else that concerns you, Miss Dexter. And I says, stopping these fellows a bit. "Yes it's me. I'm on my way to town with nine barrels of apples."