We loved the spot and , besides , I wished to remain for Uncle Jesse 's sake . He was failing all the time , and after Robert went and the excitement of the book-making was past , he failed still more rapidly . His tramping expeditions were over and he seldom went out in his boat . Neither did he talk a great deal . He liked to come over and sit silently for hours at our seaward window , looking out wistfully toward the Gate with his swiftly whitening head leaning on his hand . The only keen interest he still had was in Robert 's book . He waited and watched impatiently for its publication . `` I want to live till I see it , '' he said , `` just that long -- then I 'll be ready to go . He said it would be out in the spring -- I must hang on till it comes , Mary . '' There were times when I doubted sadly if he would `` hang on . '' As the winter wore away he grew frailer and frailer . But ever he looked forward to the coming of spring and `` the book , '' his book , transformed and glorified . One day in young April the book came at last . Uncle Jesse had gone to the post office faithfully every day for a month , expecting it , but this day he was too feeble to go and I went for him . The book was there . It was called simply , The Life-Book of Jesse Boyd , and on the title page the names of Robert Kennedy and Jesse Boyd were printed as collaborators . I shall never forget Uncle Jesse 's face as I handed it to him . I came away and left him reading it , oblivious to all else . All night the light burned in his window , and I looked out across the sands to it and pictured the delight of the old man poring over the printed pages whereon his own life was portrayed . I wondered how he would like the ending -- the ending I had suggested .
I was never XXXXX know .
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