him unload. I'll
show it to you when I come in."

But Amarita pored over it by herself, and old Mis' Meade, at the window,
knit and watched for the passing. It was a bright day, and it seemed
reasonable that at least two wagons might go by.

"Don't you want I should bring it over there," said Amarita, at length,
"and let you look at it?"

"Law, no!" old Mis' Meade responded, with the ruthlessness of one whose
mind is not on futures. "I guess I can wait till they've begun to hew
out their underpinnin'."

"Ain't it remarkable he can do a thing like that?"

"He ain't done it yet," said the old lady sagely. "I'll b'lieve it when
I'm called to the raisin'."

Amarita flushed.

"I don't see what does make you cry him down so," she declared, with a
rare resentment. "Seems if you didn't want to allow he can do the least
thing out o' the common."

"Well," said the old lady, "I dunno 's he can. There, Amarita!" She
threw caution from her as far as it would fly. "I guess I set by Elihu
enough, an' more too, but it does go ag'inst the grain to see you makin'
out he's the greatest man that ever stepped. 'Twon't be long before ye
can't live with him. Can't either of us!"

Amarita was silent, staring straight at the old lady, who glanced up
presently and blinked at her.

"You goin' to let them books set there in the front entry?" she
inquired, as if her point of attack had shifted.

"Why, yes, I s'pose so," faltered Amarita.

"Don't ye want to peek into 'em an' see what they be?"

"Why, yes; but I don't want to do anything to get Elihu into trouble
about 'em. I s'pose I was kinder foolish to believe what the man said."

"Foolish!" retorted the old lady, with vigor. "Course you was foolish.
Everybody's foolish one time out o' three. That's about the only thing
there's no patent on."

"Well, I s'pose folks do get into trouble doin' things wrong-end-to,"
said Amarita.

She felt as if she were defending Elihu in his censorship.

"Why, yes! Nobody says they don't. Let 'em git in an' let 'em git out
ag'in. It ain't doin' foolish things or not doin' 'em I complain of.
It's Elihu's settin' himself up to be the only human creatur' that
never stepped inside of a glass house. Law! if he did but know it, he's
got a ninety-nine-year lease o' one, an' if he could git it into his
head how plain I can glimpse him through the walls, a surpriseder man
you never'd see. Elihu's as good a boy as ever stepped; but if he could
be took