"Yes, yes--but how did you come to see the
child? Tell me that."
"Zack took me into the Painter-man's big room--"
"Zack! Why, good gracious Heavens! do you mean Master Zachary Thorpe?"
"I see a young woman standing among a lot of people as was all a
staring at her," continued Mat, without noticing the interruption. "I
see her just as close to, and as plain, as I see you. I see her look
up, all of a sudden, front face to front face with me. A creeping and a
crawling went through me; and I says to myself, 'Mary's child has lived
to grow up, and that's her.'"
"But, do pray tell me, how ever you come to know Master Zack?"
"I says to myself 'That's her,'" repeated Mat, his rough voice sinking
lower and lower, his attention wandering farther and farther away from
Mrs. Peckover's interruptions. "Twenty year ago had got to be like
yesterday, when I was down at the old place; and things I hadn't called
to mind for long times past, I called to mind when I come to the
churchyard-gate, and see father's house. But there was looks Mary had
with her eyes, turns Mary had with her head, bits of twitches Mary had
with her eyebrows when she looked up at you, that I'd clean forgot.
They all come back to me together, as soon as ever I see that young
woman's face.
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