ed Maggie for
manifesting no more concern.

"You'd as lief go to destruction as not, I do believe!" said she,
looking carefully after the bandbox containing her purple satin.

"I'd rather go there first," answered Maggie, pointing to a brown
old-fashioned farmhouse about a quarter of a mile away.

At first Madam Conway objected, saying she preferred sitting on the
bank to intruding herself upon strangers; but as it was now noonday,
and the warm September sun poured fiercely down upon her, she finally
concluded to follow Maggie's advice, and gathering up her box and
parasol started for the house, which, with its tansy patch on the
right, and its single poplar tree in front, presented rather an
uninviting appearance.

"Some vulgar creatures live there, I know. Just hear that old tin
horn!" she exclaimed, as a blast, loud and shrill, blown by practiced
lips, told the men in a distant field that dinner was ready.

A nearer approach disclosed to view a slanting-roofed farmhouse such
as is often found in New England, with high, narrow windows, small
panes of glass, and the most indispensable paper curtains of blue
closely shading the windows of what was probably the "best room." In
the apartment opposite, however, they were rolled up, so as to show
the old-fashioned drapery of dimity, bordered with a netted fringe.
Half a dozen broken pitchers and pots held geraniums, verbenas, and
other plants, while the well-kept beds of hollyhocks, sunflowers, and
poppies indicated a taste for flowers in someone. Everything about
the house was faultlessly neat. The doorsill was scrubbed to a chalky
white, while the uncovered floor wore the same polished hue.

All this Madam Conway saw at a glance, but it did not prevent her
from holding high her aristocratic skirts, lest they should be
contaminated, and when, in answer to her knock, an odd-looking,
peculiarly dressed woman appeared, she uttered an exclamation of
disgust, and, turning to Maggie, said, "You talk--I can't!"

But the woman did not stand at all upon ceremony. For the last ten
minutes she had been watching the strangers as they toiled over the
sandy road, and when sure they were coming there had retreated into
her bedroom, donning a flaming red calico, which, guiltless of hoops,
clung to her tenaciously, showing her form to good advantage, and
rousing at once the risibility of Maggie. A black lace cap, ornamented
with ribbons of the same fanciful color as the dress, ador