It was a ridiculously operatic little cottage, composed chiefly of
bulging balconies, scarlet and yellow with geraniums and
nasturtiums, casement windows with tiny leaded panes, and double
Dutch doors, evidently practicable. It had all the air of having
retired from the other scenery to practice for its own act, and it
seemed highly probable that a chorus of happy short-skirted
peasantry would skip out from behind it and tunefully relate the
fortunes of the heroine within.
But the only person in sight was obviously impossible of such
classification. Though she was chopping wood, and chopping it very
well, though she wore what is sometimes called a Mother Hubbard
wrapper and a stiff, clean blue-checked apron, she was not in the
least a peasant. Her figure was tall and spare, her hair gray and
drawn into an uncompromising knot, her face wrinkled and shrewd, her
eyes soft, and full of the experience that middle-age brings to the
native American woman who has lived all her life in the
sparsely-settled country districts.
Her face relaxed at sight of her visitors. "How d'ye do?" she called
cheerfully, "ma want anything?"
"I don't believe so," Caroline returned sociably, "I've just come
up, that's all."
"I thought maybe your ma was worried about them shirt-waists, but
she needn't be: I'll have 'em back by Friday, sure.
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