Elmore and Abe their start in life. Her wiry
hands were crossed in her lap in the moment of waiting: you could tell
by the look of them that they were not often crossed there. They were
strenuous hands; the whole worn figure was strenuous, and the narrow set
mouth, and the eyes which had looked after so many matters for so long,
and even the way the hair was drawn back into a knot in a fashion that
would have given a phrenologist his opportunity. It was a different Mrs
Crow from the one that sat in the midst of her poultry and garden-stuff
in the Elgin market square; but it was even more the same Mrs Crow, the
sum of a certain measure of opportunity and service, an imperial figure
in her bead trimming, if the truth were known.

The room was heated to express the geniality that was harder to put in
words. The window was shut; there was a smell of varnish and whatever
was inside the "suite" of which Mrs Crow occupied the sofa. Enlarged
photographs--very much enlarged--of Mr and Mrs Crow hung upon the walls,
and one other of a young girl done in that process which tells you at
once that she was an only daughter and that she is dead. There had been
other bereavements; they were written upon the silver coffin-plates
which, framed and glazed, also contributed to the decoration of the
room; but you would have had to look close, and you might feel a
delicacy.

Mrs Crow made her greetings with precision, and sat down again upon the
sofa for a few minutes' conversation.

"I'm telling them," said her husband, "that the sleighin's just held
out for them. If it 'ud been tomorrow they'd have had to come on wheels.
Pretty soft travellin' as it was, some places, I guess."

"Snow's come early this year," said Mrs Crow. "It was an open fall,
too."

"It has certainly," Mr Farquharson backed her up. "About as early as I
remember it. I don't know how much you got out here; we had a good foot
in Elgin."

"'Bout the same, 'bout the same," Mr Crow deliberated, "but it's been
layin' light all along over Clayfield way--ain't had a pair of runners
out, them folks."

"Makes a more cheerful winter, Mrs Crow, don't you think, when it comes
early?" remarked Lorne. "Or would you rather not get it till after
Christmas?"

"I don't know as it matters much, out here in the country. We don't get
a great many folks passin', best of times. An' it's more of a job to
take care of the stock."

"That's so," Mr Crow told them. "Chores come heavier whe