The time had come, wrote Jethro, for
them to marry. She was free, at last, and he had enough. Would she take
him, now? Dilly answered quite frankly and from a serenity born of
faith in the path before her and a certainty that no feet need slip.
She was ready, she wrote. She hoped he was willing she should sell the
old place, to pay Tom's debts. That would leave her without a cent; but
since he was coming for her, and she needn't go to Chicago alone, she
didn't know that there was anything to worry about. He would buy her
ticket. There was an ineffable simplicity about Dilly. She had no
respect whatever for money, save as a puzzling means to a few necessary
ends. And now the place had been sold, and Jethro was coming in a
month. Meanwhile Dilly was to pack up the few family effects she could
afford to keep, and the rest would go by auction.
Little as she was accustomed to dread experiences which came in the
inevitable order of nature, she did think of the last day and night in
the old house as something of an ordeal. People felt that the human
meant very little to Dilly; but that was not true. It was only true
that she held herself remote from personal intimacies; but all the
fine, invisible bonds of race and family took hold of her like
irresistible factors, and welded her to the universe anew.
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