The Reverend John Hapgood--a man who ruled himself and all about him
with the iron rod of a rigid old-school orthodoxy--died when the twins
were twenty; and the frail little woman who, as his wife, had for thirty
years lived and moved solely because he expected breath and motion of
her, followed soon in his footsteps. And then the twins were left alone
in the great square house on the hill.
Miss Tabitha and Miss Rachel were not the only children of the family.
There had been a son--the first born, and four years their senior. The
headstrong boy and the iron rule had clashed, and the boy, when sixteen
years old, had fled, leaving no trace behind him.
If the Reverend John Hapgood grieved for his wayward son the members of
his household knew it not, save as they might place their own
constructions on the added sternness to his eyes and the deepening lines
about his mouth. "Paul," when it designated the graceless runaway, was a
forbidden word in the family, and even the Epistles in the sacred Book,
bearing the prohibited name, came to be avoided by the head of the house
in the daily readings. It was still music in the hearts of the women,
however, though it never passed their lips; and when the little mother
lay dying she remembered and spoke of her boy.
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