Chantrey would very likely not be there. But Ann Holland had already
decided not to go. At any moment she might hear her brother's shambling
step draw near the door, and his fingers fumbling at the latch. She
could not bear the neighbors to see him when he came off one of his
vagabond tramps, dirty and ragged as he usually was. She must stay at
home again for him; again, as she had done hundreds of times, mourning
pitifully over him, and ready to receive him patiently, impenitent as he
was. She went up stairs to make his bed quite ready for him; and to put
out of his way everything that could by any chance hurt him, if he
should stumble and fall in his drunken weakness. When she returned to
the kitchen, she lighted a candle, and opened the old family Bible, with
its large type, which seemed to her a more sacred book than the little
one she used daily. But she could not read; the words passed vaguely and
without meaning beneath her eyes. Her mind was full of the thought of
her unhappy brother, and Mr. Chantrey's miserable wife.
It was past her usual hour of going to bed before she made up the
kitchen fire to be in readiness, lest her brother should knock her up at
any hour during the night.
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