Chapter 25

David Brower had prospered, as I have said before, and now he
was chiefly concerned in the welfare of his children. So, that he
might give us the advantages of the town, he decided either to
lease or sell his farm- by far the handsomest property in the
township. I was there when a buyer came, in the last days of that
summer. We took him over the smooth acres from Lone Pine to
Woody Ledge, from the top of Bowman's Hill to Tinkie Brook in
the far valley. He went with us through every tidy room of the
house. He looked over the stock and the stables.

'Wall! what's it wuth?' he said, at last, as we stood looking down
the fair green acres sloping to the sugar bush.

David picked up a stick, opened his knife, and began to whittle
thoughtfully, a familiar squint of reflection in his face. I suppose
he thought of all it had cost him - the toil of many years, the
strength of his young manhood, the youth and beauty of his wife, a
hundred things that were far better than money.

'Fifteen thousan' dollars,' he said slowly - 'not a cent less.' The man
parleyed a little over the price.

'Don' care t' take any less t'day,' said David calmly. 'No harm done.'

'How much down?'

David named the sum.

'An' possession?'

'Next week'

'Everything as it stan's?'

'Everything as it stan's 'cept the beds an' bedding.'

'Here's some money on account,' he said. 'We'll close t'morrer?'

'Close t'morrer,' said David, a little sadness in his tone, as he took
the money.

It was growing dusk as the man went away. The crickets sang with
a loud, accusing, clamour. Slowly we turned and went into the
dark house, David whistling under his breath. Elizabeth was
resting in her chair. She was humming an old hymn as she rocked.

'Sold the farm, mother,' said David.

She stopped singing but made no answer. In the dusk, as we sat
down, I saw her face leaning upon her hand. Over the hills and out
of the fields around us came many voices - the low chant in the
stubble, the baying of a hound in the far timber, the cry of the tree
toad - a tiny drift of odd things (like that one sees at sea) on the
deep eternal silence of the heavens. There was no sound in the
room save the low creaking of the rocker in which Elizabeth sat.
After all the going, and corning, and doing, and saying of many
years here was a little spell of silence and beyond lay the untried
things of the future. For me it was a time of reckoning.

'Been hard at work here all these years, mother,' said David.
'Oughter be glad t' git away.'

'Yes,' said she sadly, 'it's been hard work. Years ago I thought I
never could stan' it. But now I've got kind o' used t' it.'

'Time ye got