She had it hard for
a good many years, but I believe 't is all made up to her; I do
certain."
Nan meant to go back to the village by the shorter way of the little
foot-path, but first she went up the grass-grown lane toward the old
farm-house. She stood for a minute looking about her and across the
well-known fields, and then seated herself on the door-step, and
stayed there for some time. There were two or three sheep near by,
well covered and rounded by their soft new winter wool, and they all
came as close as they dared and looked at her wonderingly. The narrow
path that used to be worn to the door-step had been overgrown years
ago with the short grass, and in it there was a late little dandelion
with hardly any stem at all. The sunshine was warm, and all the
country was wrapped in a thin, soft haze.
She thought of her grandmother Thacher, and of the words that had just
been said; it was beginning to seem a very great while since the days
of the old farm-life, and Nan smiled as she remembered with what tones
of despair the good old woman used to repeat the well-worn phrase,
that her grandchild would make either something or nothing. It seemed
to her that she had brought all the success of the past and her hopes
for the future to the dear old place that afternoon. Her early life
was spreading itself out like a picture, and as she thought it over
and looked back from year to year, she was more than ever before
surprised to see the connection of one thing with another, and how
some slight acts had been the planting of seeds which had grown and
flourished long afterward.
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