vening following that Mrs. Jane Maxwell came. Mrs. Field,
sitting with her guests, felt a strange contraction of her heart when
she heard the door open.

"Who's that comin'?" asked Mrs. Babcock.

"I guess it's old Mr. Maxwell's brother Henry's wife," replied Mrs.
Field.

She arose. Lois went quickly and softly out of the other door. She
felt sure that exposure was near, and her first impulse was to be out
of sound and hearing of it. She sat there in the dark on the front
door-step awhile, then she went into the house. Sitting there in
doubt, half hearing what might be dreadful to hear, was worse than
certainty. She had at once a benumbing terror and a fierce desire
that her mother should be betrayed, and withal a sudden impulse of
loyalty toward her, a feeling that she would stand by her when
everybody else turned against her.

She crept in and sat down. Mrs. Maxwell was talking to Mrs. Babcock
about the state of the church in Elliot. It was wonderful that this
call was made without exposure, but it was. Twice Mrs. Maxwell called
Jane Field "Esther," but nobody noticed it except Amanda, and she
said nothing. She only caught her breath each time with a little
gasp.

Mrs. Maxwell addressed herself almost wholly to Mrs. Babcock
concerning her daughter, her daughter's husband, and the people of
Elliot. Mrs. Babcock constantly bore down upon her, and swerved her
aside with her own topics. Indeed, all the conversation lay between
these two. There was a curious similarity between them. They belonged
apparently to some one subdivision of human nature, being as birds of
the same feather, and seemed to instinctively recognize this fact.

They were at once attracted, and regarded each other with a kind of
tentative cordiality, which might later become antagonism, for they
were on a level for either friendship or enmity.

Mrs. Maxwell made a long call, as she was accustomed to do. She was a
frequent visitor, generally coming in the evening, and going home
laden with spoil, creeping from cover to cover like a cat. She was
afraid to have her daughter and nephew know of all the booty she
obtained. She had many things snugly tucked away in bureau drawers
and the depths of closets which she had carried home under her shawl
by night. Jane Field was only too glad to give her all for which she
asked or hinted.

To-night, as Mrs. Maxwell took leave of the three strange women
standing in a prim row, she gave a meaning nod to Mrs.