o help her! They
looked like they was petrified to stone, and I'm a great mind to make
'em every one up into pies and salad and such. They's a heap of men,
come trouble, don't make no show, and the women folks have to lead the
fight. But they might er helped her after she's took holt!"

"The brutes!" exclaimed Doctor Tom with real indignation. "When are you
going to have the pie, Mother?" he added teasingly.

"Well, I've got no intentions of feeding no such coward truck to you,
sir," answered his mother, still flurried with belligerency.

"But the little baby chicken--what DID become of it?" demanded Miss
Wingate, and she, too, cast a glance of scorn at the Doctor.

"Why, he dropped it and flew away as soon as he caught sight of me. It
ain't hurt a mite, and Spangles have hovered it and all the rest she
could coax out from under Dominick. Now this do settle it! Good looks
don't disqualify a woman from nothing; it's the men that can't stand
extra long tail feathers and fluted combs. I'm a-going to put 'em all
four in the pot before Wednesday."

"I apologize; I apologize, with emotion, for all my doubts, both
expressed and unexpressed, of Mrs. Spangles!" the Doctor hastened to
exclaim. "Neck under heel for the whole masculine fraternity and
suffrage triumphant!"

"Well, it's not as bad as that," answered Mother in a jovially
mollified tone of voice. "Meek, plain-favored men like you may be let
live, with no attention paid 'em. Now go on over to Flat Rock and stop
a-wasting me and my honey-bird's time with your chavering. Come back
early for supper or you won't get none, for all three of us are a-going
to prayer meeting."

"I'll be here, and thank you for-crumbs of attention," answered the
Doctor, and, with a laughing glance at both his mother and Miss Wingate
he took himself off in the direction of the barn, for the purpose of
saddling his horse for his afternoon visit to his patients beyond the
Nob.

"Ain't he good to look at?" asked Mother Mayberry as she watched his
tall figure swing down the garden path. "Good looks in a man can be a
heap of pleasure to a woman, but she mustn't let on to him."

"I believe," said Miss Wingate in an impersonally judicial tone of
voice, "that Doctor Mayberry is the very handsomest man I ever saw. One
would almost call him beautiful. It isn't entirely that he is so tall
and grand and has such eyes, but--do you know I think it is because he
is so like you that he is so lovely."