red, benevolent expression as the man's, mingled
with the same strained air of desperate resolve. "'Most ready, Jake!"
she mumbled through a mouthful of pins, "'most ready! Arabella!
Arabella! Did you put in the bottle of raspberry vinegar?"

"Yes, yes, Hannah! Don't you worry?" cried the little faded lilac
woman, reassuringly.

"An' the cookies, an' the pound cake, an' the home-made cheese?"

A third woman bounded down the steps, and charged through the chickens
with a bundle of wrappings. She was a smart, tidy little body, with a
sharp face and a determined manner. At the sight of her the big man's
gloomy face took on an expression of hope.

"Susan! Susan Winters! D'ye think you could get us off?" he implored.
"We'll miss that train as sure as blazes!"

She paid not the slightest attention. "Ras'berry vinegar!" she
shrieked. "Hannah Sawyer, don't you know that there orphant may be an
infant in arms, an' if it is, it'll die of colic on the road home if
you fill it up with such stuff!"

The face which had disappeared from between the curtains came into view
again, red and alarmed. "Mercy me, Susan! I didn't know. I'll give
it to Jake's cousin. Arabella, did you put in the pound cake and the
home----" The words died away amid the curtains.

"Couldn't you get us off somehow, Susan?" besought the big man again,
looking down, helplessly, at the small woman, much as a becalmed
frigate might at a noisy little tug.

"Well, Jake Sawyer, if half them trollops o' weemin in there would
clear out and leave me alone, I'd 'a' had you at the station by this
time. Hannah!" she addressed the window peremptorily, "you hurry up
there an' come down, whether you're ready or not! I never agreed to
this wild-goose chase after an orphant, but now that you're half ready
you've got to go!"

There was another fleeting vision of the face between the curtains, and
a choking voice gasped something about being "jist ready."

"What that orphant's got to have is a bottle o' fresh milk!" cried Mrs.
Winters, darting back into the kitchen. A tall young lady, with a high
pompadour, was striving to squeeze two large lemon pies into a small
basket. She glanced up half apologetically as the village martinet
entered.

"Hannah said last night she didn't know whatever she'd do if it cried
on the road home, so ma thought I'd better bring over these pies. They
keep awful well, and the basket'll easy slip under the seat in the
trai