FullReads

“Well, I don’t know,” said Cynthia; “I guess she’d been pleased. She’d thought you just brought her over a little present: but I do’ know as ‘t would been any good to her after all; she’d thought so much of it, comin’ from you, that she’d kep’ it till ‘t was all candied.” But Mrs. Flagg didn’t look exactly pleased by this unexpected compliment, and her fellow-traveler colored with confusion and a sudden feeling that she had shown undue forwardness.

Presently they remembered the Beckett house, to their great relief, and, as they approached, Mrs. Flagg reached over and moved her hand-bag from the front seat to make room for another passenger. But nobody came out to stop the stage, and they saw the unexpected guest sitting by one of the front windows comfortably swaying a palm-leaf fan, and rocking to and fro in calm content. They shrank back into their corners, and tried not to be seen. Mrs. Flagg’s face grew very red.

“She got in, didn’t she?” said Miss Pickett, snipping her words angrily, as if her lips were scissors. Then she heard a call, and bent forward to see Mrs. Beckett herself appear in the front doorway, very smiling and eager to stop the stage.

The driver was only too ready to stop his horses. “Got a passenger for me to carry back, ain’t ye?” said he facetiously. “Them ‘s the kind I like; carry both ways, make somethin’ on a double trip,” and he gave Mrs. Flagg and Miss Pickett a friendly wink as he stepped down over the wheel. Then he hurried toward the house, evidently in a hurry to put the baggage on; but the expected passenger still sat rocking and fanning at the window.

“No, sir; I ain’t got any passengers,” exclaimed Mrs. Beckett, advancing a step or two to meet him, and speaking very loud in her pleasant excitement. “This lady that come this morning wants her large trunk with her summer things that she left to the depot in Woodville. She’s very desirous to git into it, so don’t you go an’ forgit; ain’t you got a book or somethin’, Mr. Ma’sh? Don’t you forgit to make a note of it; here’s her check, an’ we’ve kep’ the number in case you should mislay it or anything. There’s things in the trunk she needs; you know how you overlooked stoppin’ to the milliner’s for my bunnit last week.”

“Other folks disremembers things as well’s me,” grumbled Mr. Marsh. He turned to give the passengers another wink more familiar than the first, but they wore an offended air, and were looking the other way. The horses had backed a few steps, and the guest at the front window had ceased the steady motion of her fan to make them a handsome bow, and been puzzled at the lofty manner of their acknowledgment.

“Go ‘long with your foolish jokes, John Ma’sh!” Mrs. Beckett said cheerfully, as she turned away. She was a comfortable, hearty person, whose appearance adjusted the beauties of hospitality. The driver climbed to his seat, chuckling, and drove away with the dust flying after the wheels.

“Now, she’s a friendly sort of a woman, that Mis’ Beckett,” said Mrs. Flagg unexpectedly, after a few moments of silence, when she and her friend had been unable to look at each other. “I really ought to call over an’ see her some o’ these days, knowing her husband’s folks as well as I used to, an’ visitin’ of ’em when I was a girl.” But Miss Pickett made no answer.

“I expect it was all for the best, that woman’s comin’,” suggested Mrs. Flagg again hopefully. “She looked like a willing person who would take right hold. I guess Mis’ Beckett knows what she’s about, and must have had her reasons. Perhaps she thought she’d chance it for a couple o’ weeks anyway, after the lady’d come so fur, an’ bein’ one o’ her own denomination. Hayin’-time’ll be here before we know it. I think myself, gen’rally speakin’, ‘t is just as well to let anybody know you’re comin’.”

“Them seemed to be Mis’ Cap’n Timms’s views,” said Miss Pickett in a low tone; but the stage rattled a good deal, and Mrs. Flagg looked up inquiringly, as if she had not heard.