noon
Ah ! but it was that old mother worked and waited for so long : blind now , and deaf ; childish , and half dead with many hardships , but safe and free at last ; and Hepsey 's black face was full of a pride , a peace , and happiness more eloquent and touching than any speech or sermon ever uttered . Mr. Wilkins had heard her story , and been more affected by it than he would confess : now it came home to him with sudden force ; the thought of his own mother , wife , or babies torn from him stirred him to the heart , and the manliest emotion he had ever known caused him to cast his pipe at his feet , put on his hat with an energetic slap , and walk out of the house , wearing an expression on his usually wooden face that caused his wife to clap her hands and cry exultingly : `` I thought that would fetch him ! '' Then she fell to work like an inspired woman ; and at noon a sumptuous dinner `` smoked upon the board ; '' the children were scrubbed till their faces shone ; and the room was as fresh and neat as any apartment could be with the penetrating perfume of burnt flapjacks still pervading the air , and three dozen ruffled nightcaps decorating the clothes-lines overhead . `` Tell me the instant minute you see Pa a comin ' , and I 'll dish up the gravy , '' was Mrs. Wilkins 's command , as she stepped in with a cup of tea for old `` Harm , '' as she called Hepsey 's mother . `` He 's a comin ' , Ma ! '' called Gusty , presently .