"I do believe that's Margaret Williams!" exclaimed Mrs. Martin, thrusting aside the curtain and peering through the tangle of morning-glory vines that shaded her parlor window. She turned away and began arranging the chairs and straightening the table cover with the nervous haste of a fastidious housekeeper unprepared for company. But there was no need for haste. The expected caller paused at the gate and seemed to be making a critical survey of the house and premises. Her air was that of a person examining a piece of property with a view to purchasing it. She walked slowly along the garden path, gazing up at the sloping roof and the dormer windows, and on the first step of the porch she paused and looked around at the tidy front yard, with its clumps of shrubbery, fine old trees, and beds of blossoming flowers. Within, Mrs. Martin was nervously awaiting her visitor's knock. She had taken off her kitchen apron and smoothed her hair down with her hands. But no knock was heard, for Mrs. Williams placidly continued her survey of the house and its surroundings, until the voice of her hostess interrupted her. "Why, Mrs. Williams! Have you been standin' out here all this time? I must be losin' my hearin' when I can't hear a person knockin' at the door." "Nothin's the matter with your hearin'," responded Mrs. Williams, following her hostess into the shady parlor; "I hadn't knocked." She seated herself in a rocking-chair that suited her generous proportions and began looking at the inside of the house with the same business-like scrutiny she had given the outside. "We're havin' some pleasant weather now," said Mrs. Martin, by way of a conversational beginning. "Mighty pleasant weather," said Mrs. Williams, "but I came here this mornin' to talk about somethin' a good deal more important than the weather." Long acquaintance had never wholly accustomed Mrs. Martin to the straightforward bluntness that was known as "Sarah Williams' way", and a look of apprehension and faint alarm crossed her worn, delicate face. "Oh! I hope there's nothin' wrong," she said. Apparently Mrs. Williams did not hear the gently uttered words. There was a look of stern determination on her face, and she drove straight on toward an objective point unknown to her listener. "Do you know, Mrs. Martin," she asked, "how long your Henry has been courtin' my Anna Belle?" Mrs. Martin looked bewildered. "Why, no," she said, hesitatingly. "I don't believe I ever thought about it."