Mary's wedding-day had dawned but instead of being up at first fowl crow and running around helping Maum Hannah get everything ready, she lay still in her bed in the shed room, thinking, pretending to sleep, watching the streaks of light creep in through the cabin cracks, while the old woman moved quietly about in the big room, rousing the fire in the chimney, filling the kettle with fresh water, stirring at the pots on the hearth and pushing them up closer to the fire so the breakfast victuals could cook faster.
Mary was happy over her wedding. God knew she had loved July all of her life; yet, when she thought of leaving Maum Hannah and Budda Ben and this kind old house where she had been born and where she had spent most of her life, something inside her breast ached.
She had no father and her mother had been dead for years, but Maum Hannah had been like a mother to her, Budda Ben, Maum Hannah's crippled son, had been both a father and a brother, and this old tottering house was like a
