was commonplace—"My dear son, Elim"—but what followed confused him by the totally unexpected shock it contained: Hester, his wife, was dead.
At first he was unable to comprehend the details of what had happened to him; the fact itself was of such disturbing significance. He had never considered the possibility of Hester's dying; he had come to think of her as a lifelong responsibility. She had seemed, in her invalid's chair, withdrawn from the pressure of life as it bore upon others, more enduring than his father's haggard concern over the increasing difficulties of material existence and spiritual salvation, than his mother's flushed toiling.
Elim had lived with no horizon wider than the impoverished daily necessity; he had accepted this with mingled fatality and fortitude; any rebellion had been immediately suppressed as a wicked reflection upon Deity. His life had been ordered in this course; he had accepted it the more readily from his inherited distrust of worldly values and aspirations; it had, in short, been he, and now the foundations of his entire existence had been overthrown.
He read the letter more carefully, realizing the probable necessity of his immediate return home for the funeral. But that was dispelled—his father wrote that it had been necessary to bury Hester at once. The elder Meikeljohn proceeded relentlessly to an exact exposition of why this had been done. "A black swelling" was included in the details. He finished:
"And if it would be inconvenient for you to leave your work at this time it is not necessary for you to come here. In some ways it would be better for you to stay. There is little enough for you to do and it would stop your money