These days of waiting were filled with a queer sense of expectancy, as the air is sometimes charged with electric currents before a storm. No matter what she did or what she thought about, it was always with the sense of something exciting about to happen. The feeling exhilarated her, deepened the glow in her face, the happy eagerness in her eyes, until every one around her felt the contagion of her high hopefulness. "I don't know what it is you're always looking so pleased over," the old postmaster said to her one day, "but every time after you've been in here, I catch myself smiling away as broadly as if I'd heard some good news myself." "Maybe," answered Mary, "it's because I feel all the time as if I'm just _going_ to hear some. It's so interesting wondering what turn things will take. It's like waiting for the curtain to go up on a new play that you've never heard of before. My curtain may go up in any part of the United States. It all depends on which letter it is that brings me a position." "I should think you'd be a leetle mite anxious," said the Captain, who was in somewhat of a pessimistic mood that day. "They can't all be equally good. You remember what the old hymn says: "'Should I be carried to the skies on flowery beds of ease Whilst others fought to win the prize, and sailed through bloody seas.'" "Oh, I'm not expecting any flowery beds of ease," retorted Mary. "I don't mind hard work and all sorts of disagreeable things if they'll only prove to be stepping-stones to carry me through my Red Sea. I don't even ask to go over dry-shod as the Children of the Exodus did. All I want is a chance to wade." "That's right! That's right!" exclaimed the Captain admiringly. "That's the proper spirit to show. It's a pity, though, that you can't do your wading somewhere around Lone-Rock. We'll miss you dreadfully. And I'm not the only one who thinks so, either. From all I hear there's somebody up the street who would almost rob the mails if doing so would keep you from getting a letter calling you away." From the twinkle of the eyes which peered at her through the steel-bowed glasses, Mary knew that he was referring to Pink Upham, but before she could reply the mail carrier dashed up on horseback from the railroad station, with the big leather pouch swung across the horse in front of him. It was the signal for every one along the street, who had seen him, to come sauntering into the office to wait for the distribution of the mail. Mary climbed up on the high stool again. She had started out from home, intending to take a tramp far up the mountain road, but stopping in the office to post a letter had stayed on talking longer than she intended.