Among the numerous visitors was Essie Hill, who had recently experienced the sudden and violent change of heart which admitted her to full membership in the Improved New Mennonite Church. She wore now a little short back sailor like the older women, with an inscription across the front to the effect that she was a worker in the vineyard. Essie was sincere; she was good, but Katy hated her. When she told Essie, not without a few impertinent embroideries, that her grandmother was asleep, Essie departed with a quiet acceptance of the rebuff which no Millerstonian would have endured without resentment. Essie's placid soul, however, was not easily disturbed. She performed her duty in offering to sit by Grandmother Gaumer and to read and pray with her; further she was not obligated.
Katy heard no more Alvin's clear whistle in the garden. She said to herself, in a moment of physical and mental depression, that he might easily have made a way to see her by coming with the rest of Millerstown to inquire for the invalid; then she reminded herself that the Koehlers went nowhere, had no friends.
"He is ashamed of his pop," said Katy to herself. "His pop is a black shame to him."
On Thursday she left her grandmother while she went on an errand to the store and her eyes searched every inch of Main Street and the two shorter streets which ran into it. But Alvin was nowhere to be seen. She answered shortly the questions about her grandmother, put to her by the storekeeper and by all other persons whom she met, and returned to the house in despair.
"If I could only see him," she cried to herself. "If I could only talk to him a little!"
On Sunday evening Bevy drove her out, almost by force, to the front porch. Bevy's preacher was again holding services in the next village, and Bevy was therefore free to care for the invalid. She had sought all the week an opportunity to sit by Grandmother Gaumer and to repeat the pow-wow rhymes which she firmly believed would help her. Now, sitting at the head of the bed in the dusk, she made passes in the air with her hands and motions with her lips. When she was certain that Grandmother Gaumer slept, she slid down to her hands and knees and crept three times round the bed, repeating the while some mystic rhyme. In reality, Grandmother Gaumer did not sleep, but lay amusedly conscious of the administrating of Bevy's therapeutic measures.
Meanwhile Katy was not alone. Had Bevy suspected the company into which she was sending her beloved, it is probable that one spring would have carried her down the steps, and another to the porch.
Katy sat for a long time on the step with her chin in her hands. She was thin, her eyes were unnaturally large, the hard work of nursing had worn her out. Her gaze searched the street, and she shrank into the shadow of the honeysuckle vine when couples paraded slowly by, arm in arm.
"I have nobody," mourned Katy, weakly, to herself. "Nobody in all the world but my gran'mom, and she cannot even speak to me."
After a long time Katy's sharp gaze detected a lurking figure across the street. Her heart throbbed, she leaned forward out of the shadow of the vine. Then she called a soft "Alvin!"