Part 15 (2/2)

The woman's face also was flushed. She turned about with a little flirt, when suddenly a door slammed somewhere in the house. The woman faced about, with a look of indignant surprise.

Lois said nothing. She opened the front door and went into the house, straight through to the kitchen, where her mother was preparing breakfast. ”There's a woman out there,” she said.

”Who is it?”

”I don't know. She wants to see--Mrs. Maxwell.”

Lois looked full at her mother; her eyes were like an angel's before evil. Mrs. Field looked back at her. Then she turned toward the door.

Lois caught hold of her mother's dress. Mrs. Field twitched it away fiercely, and pa.s.sed on into the sitting-room. The woman stood there waiting. She had followed Lois in.

”How do you do, Mis' Maxwell?” she said.

”I'm pretty well, thank you,” replied Mrs. Field, looking at her with stiff inquiry.

The woman had a pale, pretty face, and stood with a st.u.r.dy set-back on her heels. ”I guess you don't know me, Mis' Maxwell,” said she, smiling deprecatingly.

Mrs. Field tried to smile, but her lips were too stiff. ”I guess I--don't,” she faltered.

The smile faded from the woman's face. She cast an anxious glance at her own face in the gla.s.s over the mantel-shelf; she had placed herself so she could see it. ”I ain't got quite so much color as I used to have,” she said, ”but I ain't thought I'd changed much other ways. Some days I have more color. I know I ain't this mornin'. I ain't had very good health. Maybe that's the reason you don't know me.”

Mrs. Field muttered a feeble a.s.sent.

”I'd know you anywhere, but you didn't have any color to lose to make a difference. You've always looked jest the way you do now since I've known you. I lived in this house a whole year with you once. I come here to live after Mr. Maxwell's wife died. My name is Jay.”

Mrs. Field stood staring. The woman, who had been looking in the gla.s.s while she talked, gave her front hair a little shake, and turned toward her inquiringly.

”Won't you sit down in this rockin'-chair, Mis' Jay?” said Mrs.

Field.

”No, thank you, I guess I won't set down, I'm in a little of a hurry.

I jest wanted to see you a minute.”

Mrs. Field waited.

”You know Mr. Maxwell's dyin' so sudden made a good deal of a change for me,” Mrs. Jay continued. She took out her handkerchief and wiped her eyes softly; then she glanced in the gla.s.s. ”I'd had my home here a good many years, an' it seemed hard to lose it all in a minute so.

There he came home that Sunday noon an' eat a hearty dinner, an'

before sunset he had that shock, and never spoke afterward. I've thought maybe there were things he would have said if he could have spoke.”

Mrs. Jay sighed heavily; her eyes reddened; she straightened her bonnet absently; her silvered fair hair was frizzed under it.

Mrs. Field stood opposite, her eyes downcast, her face rigid.

”I wanted to speak to you, Mis' Maxwell,” the other woman went on. ”I ain't obliged to go out anywheres to live; I've got property; but it's kind of lonesome at my sister's, where I'm livin'. It's a little out of the village, an' there ain't much pa.s.sin'. I like to be where I can see pa.s.sin', an' get out to meetin' easy if it's bad weather.

I've been thinkin'--I didn't know but maybe you'd like to have me--I heard you had some trouble with your hands, an' your niece wa'n't well--that I might be willin' to come an' stay three or four weeks. I shouldn't want to promise to stay very long.”

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