"Yes, I laughed out loud, an' you passed me a pep'mint over the pew, an' looked as if you was goin' to cry. 'Don't,' says you; an' it sort o' come over me you knew what I was laughin' at. Why, if there ain't John Freeman stoppin' here,--Mary's sister's brother-in-law, you know. Lives down to Bell P'int. Guess he's pullin' up to give the news." Mrs. Pettis came slowly to her feet, and scanned the farmer, who was hitching his horse to the fence. When he had gone round to the back door, she turned, and grasped her umbrella with a firmer hand. "Well, I guess 'twon't pay me to set down ag'in," she announced. "I'm goin' to take it easy on the way home. I dunno but I'll let down the bars, an' poke a little ways into the north pastur', an' see if I can't git a mite o' pennyr'yal. I'll be in ag'in to-morrer or next day." "So do, so do," returned Mrs. Lamson. "'Tain't no use to ask you to come down, I s'pose? You don't git, out so fur, nowadays." "No," said the other, still with that latent touch of sarcasm in her voice. "If I should fall, there'd be a great hurrah, boys,--'fire on the mountain, run, boys, run!'" Mrs. Pettis toiled out into the road; and Old Lady Lamson, laying her knitting on the table, bent forward, not to watch her out of sight, but to make sure whether she really would stop at the north pasture. "No, she's goin' by," she said aloud, with evident relief. "No, she ain't either. I'll be whipped if she ain't lettin' down the bars! _'Twould_ smell kind o' good, I declare!" She was still peering forward, one slender hand on the window-sill, when Mary, a pretty young woman, with two nervous lines between her eyes, came hurrying in. "Mother," she began, in that unnatural voice which is supposed to allay excitement in another, "I dunno what I'm goin' to do. Stella's sick." "You don't say!" said Old Lady Lamson, turning away from the window. "What do they think 'tis?" "Fever, John says. An' she's so full-blooded it'll be likely to go hard with her. They want me to go right down, an' David's got to carry me. John would, but he's gone to be referee in that land case, an' he won't be back for a day or two. It's a mercy David's just home from town, so he won't have to change his clo'es right through. Now, mother, if you should have little 'Liza Tolman come an' stay with you, do you think anything would happen, s'posin' we left you alone just one night?" A little flush rose in the old lady's withered cheek. Her eyes gleamed brightly through her glasses. "Don't you worry one mite about me," she replied, in an even voice. "You change your dress, an' git off afore it's dark. I shall be all right." "David's harnessin' now," said Mary, beginning to untie her apron. "I sent John down to the lower barn to call him. But, mother, if anything should happen to you--"