The two women looked at each other.
Suddenly Hannah threw out her arms from under her shawl, and clasped Sylvia.

"Oh, Sylvy," she sobbed out, "to think you was settin' out for the poor-house this mornin', an' we havin' a weddin' last night, an' never knowin' it! Why didn't you say anythin' about it, why didn't you, Sylvy ?" "I knew you couldn't do anything, Hannah." "Knew I couldn't do anything! Do you suppose me or Sarah would have let all the sister we've got go to the poor-house whilst we had a roof over our heads?
We'd took you right in, either one of us." "I was afraid Silas an' Cephas wouldn't be willin'." "I guess they'd had to be willin'.

I told Silas just now that if Richard Alger didn't come forward like a man, you was comin' to my house, an' have the best we've got as long as you lived.

Silas, he said he thought you'd ought to earn your own livin', an' I told him there wa'n't any chance for a woman like you to earn your livin' in Pembroke, that you could earn your livin' enough livin' at your own sister's.

Oh, Sylvy, I can't stand it, when I think of your startin' out that way, an' never sayin' a word." Hannah sobbed convulsively on her sister's shoulder.