Miss Gibbie would not stay to dinner. "I am fond of you, my dear," she said, tying the ribbon strings1 loosely under her chin, "but I might not be if I had to talk to you after a full meal. And that's the trouble—you make me talk too much. If you prefer this middle-class custom of a mid-day dinner, follow it, but don't ask me to join you."
Mary Cary laughed. "I don't think it's middle-class. I think it's nice; it's Southern." Miss Gibbie's broad-brimmed hat was straightened, the crumpled2 ribbons smoothed, the plump cheeks kissed. "And if I didn't have dinner at two o'clock I couldn't have supper at seven. Thin ham and beaten biscuits and salads and iced tea and summer things like that are much nicer then meats and vegetables and desserts on warm nights. I'm not stylish3. I'm just Mary Cary, who loves old-fashioned ways and things."
"Old-fashioned /ways/ and /things!/" Miss Gibbie's hands went up. "To-morrow all Yorkburg will be calling you a young woman of shocking ideas, one who actually knows something about business, about the town's financial condition and the things it needs and should have. You will be served at breakfast, dinner, and supper; held up as an example of the pernicious effects of higher education followed by foreign travel. To-night you are going to do what has never been done here before, and who is going to imagine you love old-fashioned ways and things? A woman has never crossed the threshold of Yorkburg's Council Chamber—"
"A good many are going to cross it to-night."
Miss Gibbie, who had started to the door, turned. "You mean a good many have promised. A very different thing. Women are cowards when it comes to a change of custom. They like their little cages. They would rather stay in and look on than come out and help. Don't expect too much of them. They have so long thought as men told them God intended them to think that it will take time for them to realize the Almighty5 may not object to their inquiring if they're thinking right or not. Good-bye, child. If any fireworks go off, keep your head and send up a few yourself. Heavens, if I were young!"
As she drove off, Mary Cary waved to her, then turned and stood a moment in the wide, cool hall, looking first in the library on the right, the dining-room on the left, at the broad, winding6 staircase in front, and through the open door at the end to the orchard7, which in the distance could be glimpsed, and her hands clasped as if to press closely the happiness that filled her.
It was hers, all hers. The dream of her starved little heart, when, as a child, she had lived in the Yorkburg Orphan8 Asylum9, had come true. She had a home of her own.
"And I didn't have to take a husband to get it," she said, nodding her head. "That's such a satisfaction."
She dropped in the big chintz-covered chair and, with elbows on its arms and finger-tips pressed to cheeks, surveyed critically the size and shape and furnishings of the rooms, then sighed in happy content.
"It's such a pity so many people still think a home /must/ have a man in it. If a man belongs to you and is nice he might make the home nicer, but"—she shook her head—"Mrs. McDougal says there are times when a husband is a great trial. I haven't any brothers or a father, and I don't want to risk a trial yet. The reason most homes need men is because men mean money, I suppose. You can't sneeze without needing money. And yet"—she looked around—"everything in this house didn't cost as much as the rug Mrs. Maxwell has on her drawing-room floor. I don't wonder John loathes10 his house. You can't really see the price-tags on the things in it, but you're certain you could find them if you had the chance to look. I wonder where John's letter is?" She got up and went into the library, turned over papers and magazines on desk and tables, then rang for Hedwig.
"The mail?" she said. "Where did you put the letters this morning?"
Hedwig shook her head. "There no letters were this morning, mein
Fraulein. Not one at all."
"That's queer! All right." Hedwig was waved away. "I wonder if anything is the matter? Of course there isn't—only—there haven't been three Mondays since I left here that John's letter didn't come on the early mail." She straightened a rose that was falling out of a jar and stood off to watch the effect. "Nobody but John would write every week, when I don't write once in four—don't even read his letters for days after they come, sometimes. But I like to know they're here. I believe"—she clasped her hands behind her head—"I believe I wish I had let him come down to-night. No, I don't. But why didn't he write? He ought to have known—" She turned away. "It would serve me right if he never wrote again."
By seven o'clock she was on her way to the monthly meeting of the town council, which meeting was always held on the second Monday evening in the month, and as she started off she waved to Hedwig, standing11 in the door.
"Telephone Miss Gibbie not to sit up for me," she called back. "I'm going to stay all night with her, but it may be late before I get there. Don't forget!" And again the hand was waved; and as she drove down the dusty road, Ephraim beside her, the uncertainty12 of the morning faded and her spirits rose at the prospect13 of the experience awaiting.
"You see," she thought to herself, "I've had the advantage of being poor and not expecting things to go just as I want them, so it takes a great deal to discourage me. When you're dealing14 with human nature it's the unexpected you must expect. 'Human nature are a rascal,' Mrs. McDougal says, and Mrs. McDougal's observations come terribly near being true." She laughed and whistled softly, but at Ephraim's discreet15 cough stopped and turned toward him.
"I oughtn't to do it, ought I, Ephraim? It isn't nice. I am afraid I forget sometimes I am really and truly grown up."
"I reckon you does." Ephraim touched his hat. "You's right smart of a child yet in some things, 'count of yo' young heart, I reckon. I ain't never seen nobody who could see the sunny side like you kin4, but it ain't all sunny, Miss Mary, this worl' ain't, and there's a lot of pesky people in it." He coughed again. "Sometimes folks seem to forgit you is your grandpa's grandchild. Yo' grandpa was the high-steppinist gentleman I ever seen in my life, but since you been goin' down among them mill folks and factory folks and takin' an intrus' in 'em, lookin' into how things is, some of them King Street people seem to think, scusin' of my sayin' it, that maybe it's yo' father's blood what's comin' out in you."
Mary Cary laughed. "I hope it is. My father was a very sensible gentleman, and didn't ask others what he must or must not do. But his people in England would be more shocked than—" She stopped and her lips twisted in a queer little smile. "Put me down here, Ephraim. I am going first to Mrs. Corbin's."
Twenty minutes later she and Mrs. Corbin walked up the stops of the side entrance of the town hall into the room where all public meetings were held, and where all business connected with the town's interest was transacted16. As they reached the top the hum of many voices greeted them. The narrow passageway was half filled with men. Some were standing, hands in pockets; some, balancing themselves on the railing, with feet twisted around its spokes18, held their hands loosely clasped in front, while others leaned against the wall, scribbled19 over with pencil-marks and finger-prints of varying sizes, and ahead, through the open door, could be seen both men and women.
As they came nearer, those on the railing jumped down; those leaning against the wall straightened, and those in front made way, while hats came off and spitting ceased.
"Good-evening," she said. "We are going to have a mice meeting, aren't we?" She held out her hand. "How do you do, Mr. Jernigan. Is Jamie better to-night?"
"Yes, ma'am; thank you, ma'am. He's right sharp better to-night. He's pleased as Punch over those drawings things you sent him. Been at 'em all day."
"That's good." She reached the door, them turned, taking off her long, light coat which covered the white dress. "Aren't you men coming in?"
"Yes'm—that is, those of us what can." It was Mr. Flournoy, foreman of the woolen20 mills, who spoke17. "There ain't much room in there left and they say some more ladies is coming, so we thought we might as well stay out as come out. We can hear all right."
"I'm sorry. The women ought not to take the men's places. Can't you—"
"Oh, that's all right." Mr. Jernigan............