Keziah Coffin | Page 3

already use to calculate
your applicable taxes. If you don't derive profits, no royalty is due.
Royalties are payable to "Project Gutenberg
Association/Carnegie-Mellon University" within the 60 days following

each date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) your annual
(or equivalent periodic) tax return.
WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU
DON'T HAVE TO?
The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, scanning
machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty free copyright
licenses, and every other sort of contribution you can think of. Money
should be paid to "Project Gutenberg Association / Carnegie-Mellon
University".
*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN
ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END*

This etext was prepared by Donald Lainson, [email protected].

KEZIAH COFFIN
by Joseph C. Lincoln

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I.
--IN WHICH KEZIAH HEARS OF TWO PROPOSALS AND THE
BEGINNING OF A THIRD
II.--IN WHICH KEZIAH UNEARTHS A PROWLER
III.--IN WHICH KEZIAH ASSUMES A GUARDIANSHIP

IV.--IN WHICH KEZIAH'S PARSON DECIDES TO RUN IT
BLINDFOLD
V.--IN WHICH THE PARSON CRUISES IN STRANGE WATERS
VI.--IN WHICH OLD FRIENDS MEET
VII.--IN WHICH CAPTAIN NAT PICKS UP A DERELICT
VIII.--IN WHICH THE PARSON AND MR. PEPPER DECLARE
THEIR INDEPENDENCE
IX.--IN WHICH MISS DANIELS DETERMINES TO FIND OUT
X.--IN WHICH KEZIAH'S TROUBLES MULTIPLY
XI.--IN WHICH CAPEN EBEN RECEIVES A CALLER
XII.--IN WHICH CAPTAIN EBEN MAKES PORT
XIII.--IN WHICH KEZIAH BREAKS THE NEWS
XIV.--IN WHICH THE SEA MIST SAILS
XV.--IN WHICH TRUMET TALKS OF CAPTAIN NAT
XVI--IN WHICH THE MINISTER BOARDS THE SAN JOSE
XVII.--IN WHICH EBENEZER CAPEN IS SURPRISED
XVIII.--IN WHICH KEZIAH DECIDES TO FIGHT
XIX.--IN WHICH A RECEPTION IS CALLED OFF
XX.--IN WHICH THE MINISTER RECEIVES A LETTER
XXI.--IN WHICH MR. STONE WASHES HIS HANDS
XXII.--IN WHICH KEZIAH'S PARSON PREACHES ONCE MORE

KEZIAH COFFIN
by Joseph C. Lincoln
CHAPTER I
IN WHICH KEZIAH HEARS TWO PROPOSALS AND THE
BEGINNING OF A THIRD
Trumet in a fog; a fog blown in during the night by the wind from the
wide Atlantic. So wet and heavy that one might taste the salt in it. So
thick that houses along the main road were but dim shapes behind its
gray drapery, and only the gates and fences of the front yards were
plainly in evidence to the passers-by. The beach plum and bayberry
bushes on the dunes were spangled with beady drops. The pole on
Cannon Hill, where the beacon was hoisted when the packet from
Boston dropped anchor in the bay, was shiny and slippery. The new
weathervane, a gilded whale, presented to the "Regular" church by
Captain Zebedee Mayo, retired whaler, swam in a sea of cloud. The
lichened eaves of the little "Come-Outer" chapel dripped at sedate
intervals. The brick walk leading to the door of Captain Elkanah
Daniels's fine residence held undignified puddles in its hollows. And,
through the damp stillness, the muttered growl of the surf, three miles
away at the foot of the sandy bluffs by the lighthouse, sounded
ominously.
Directly opposite Captain Elkanah's front gate, on the other side of the
main road, stood the little story-and-a-half house, also the captain's
property, which for fourteen years had been tenanted by Mrs. Keziah
Coffin and her brother, Solomon Hall, the shoemaker. But Solomon
had, the month before, given up his fight with debt and illness and was
sleeping quietly in Trumet's most populous center, the graveyard. And
Keziah, left alone, had decided that the rent and living expenses were
more than her precarious earnings as a seamstress would warrant, and,
having bargained with the furniture dealer in Wellmouth for the sale of
her household effects, was now busy getting them ready for the morrow,

when the dealer's wagon was to call. She was going to Boston, where a
distant and condescending rich relative had interested himself to the
extent of finding her a place as sewing woman in a large tailoring
establishment.
The fog hung like a wet blanket over the house and its small yard,
where a few venerable pear trees, too conservative in their old age to
venture a bud even though it was almost May, stood bare and forlorn.
The day was dismal. The dismantled dining room, its tables and chairs
pushed into a corner, and its faded ingrain carpet partially stripped from
the floor, was dismal, likewise. Considering all things, one might have
expected Keziah herself to be even more dismal. But, to all outward
appearances, she was not. A large portion of her thirty-nine years of life
had been passed under a wet blanket, so to speak, and she had not
permitted the depressing covering to shut out more sunshine than was
absolutely necessary. "If you can't get cream, you might as well learn to
love your sasser of skim milk," said practical Keziah.
She was on her knees, her calico dress sleeves, patched and darned, but
absolutely clean, rolled back, uncovering a pair