The door opened directly into a low, square room. At first it was so dark that the girls could distinguish nothing, then as their eyes became accustomed to the dimness, a few chairs, a table, and a small stove set in the wide, open fireplace, were outlined. The room was bare and poor, but very clean. The old woman, after feeding the dog from a pot that was on the hearth, returned, and stood by the window, the dog behind her, after motioning her guests to be seated; but she did not speak, or ask a question as to from whence they came, or whither they were bound. She might have been accustomed to have six girls come every day, for any surprise she showed. The silence became embarrassing, until Anne, partly to break it, and partly because the chairs fell short, sat down on the floor by the collie, and began to talk to him, and through him to his mistress, in her coaxing way that no one could withstand. “Tell your missy where we found you, and how the wicked trap pinched your foot,” she crooned, scratching him under his chin until he rolled over on his back with a contentedly foolish expression. “And did yer find him trapped, and loose him, little leddie? I didn’t mind his foot was hurt, my eyes are so poor and farsome.” Her speech was fascinating, wholly unlike the harsh country dialect; and yet only now and then did she use a Scotch phrase. Thus encouraged, Anne told the story of the day’s adventures, punctuated now and then by promptings from the others, until she had said really more than she intended, and the old woman knew that her guests had heard at least one side of the tale of her misfortune. Then the sight of young faces around her seemed to warm her lonely heart and loosen her tongue. “Yes,” she said presently, but with no trace of complaint in her voice, “the place was sold a month gone to pay the taxes. The same being law and justice, I’ll not complain. And I by rights would be gone as well, but for Laddie here; and as it is, I’m but a trespasser. “I’d to deal with but the few chicks you saw out yonder, a sick pup, and an old cow that pastures behind on--the Lord forgive me!--what’s mine no longer; when the night before the day I was to go yonder,” pointing north to where the poor farm lay, “Laddie, he disappeared. “I’d not paid his tax, and so the law was against him. Leastway, the bit I’d saved to pay it was made way with by the lad I sent it to the town clerk by, and I’d no way to earn more--the lameness being too hard for me to pick and peddle berries down the turnpike. What with that fear before me, and knowing he’d taken a chick a week agone from some one, being sore tempted to find meat, I was worried in deed and truth. If he’s dead, said I, his troubles be over; but if held in bond, and breaking loose he comes home, and me away, he’ll just pine away and starve, slow and pitiful.