aunt will want her," she cut in
serenely. "She won't want anybody. 'Twill drive her well-nigh crazy to
think of spendin' the money. But 'tain't right for you to try to do all
there is to be done alone, an' you mustn't undertake it. Just go right
ahead an' get somebody in, whether your aunt likes it or not. That's the
way I'd do if it was Martin. Besides, 'tain't as if Melviny was different.
She fits in anywhere. She warn't ever known not to. She asks no questions
an' has got no opinions. She just sorter goes along as if she was walkin'
in her sleep, turnin' neither to the right nor to the left. Whatever house
she's in, it's all the same to her. I believe she'd jog up to a patient
with a breakfast tray if the stairs was burnin' under her. Nothin' moves
her."

There was a rippling laugh from Lucy.

"We'd have to have somebody like that," she said.

"You certainly would," agreed Jane. "That's why I feel Melviny's just the
one for you."

"It is so good of you to be interested."

"Bless your heart, I reckon the whole town's interested in Miss Webster
bein' took down," confessed Jane naively. "But I don't deserve no credit
for this plan; 'twas Martin's idea."

"Mar--your brother's?"

"Yes. Martin's awful upset 'bout your aunt bein' sick," announced Jane.
"He must 'a' heard it in the village when he was there this mornin', for
the minute he got back he sent me over to urge you to get somebody in.
'Course he wouldn't come himself. That would be too much to expect. But he
actually said that if you decided to fetch Melviny he'd go and get
her--an' from him that means a heap. I 'most fell over backwards when he
suggested it, for you know how Martin feels toward your aunt."

Lucy nodded in confusion. She had an uncomfortable sense that she was not
being quite frank with Jane.

"Martin would do 'bout anything for you, Miss Lucy," the woman asserted in
a sudden burst of confidence. "I----"

A cry from upstairs cut short the sentence.

"Lucy!"

"Yes, Aunt Ellen, I'll be right there."

"Go right up: I'll finish things here," whispered Jane hurriedly. "All is,
if you want Martin to go for Melviny, you have only to say the word. You
can wave a handkerchief out of the window, an' he'll understand."

"Where does Miss Grey----"

"For the land sake don't call her that. Nobody'd know who you meant, an'
she wouldn't, either."

"Well, Melviny, then--where does she live?"

"Down in the valley--King's Hollow, they call it."