"'Oh,' he says, 'it's that hole near my biggest toe. My biggest toe went right through that hole. And it's _chokin'_ me.' "Just exactly as if a hand had kind of touched us all, a nice little stir went round among us women. And with that, Insley, who had been standing there so big and strong and able and willing, and waiting for a chance to take hold, he just simply put his hands on his knees and stooped over and made his back right for the little fellow to climb up on. The child knew what it was for, soon enough--we see somebody somewheres must of been doing it for him before, for he scrambled right up, laughing, and Miss Sidney helping him. And a kind of a little ripple, that wan't no true words, run round among us all. Most women and some men is strong on ripples of this sort, but when it comes right down to doing something in consequence, we ain't so handy. "'Leave me come along and help take care of him a little while,' I says; and I thought it was because I was ashamed of myself and trying to make up for not offering before. But I think really what was the matter with me was that I just plain wanted to go along with that little boy. "'I'm your automobile,' says Insley to the little fellow, and he laughed out, delighted, hanging onto his paper sack. "'If you'll give me the big umbrella, Aunt Eleanor,' says Miss Sidney on the church steps, 'I'll try to keep the rain off the automobile and the passenger.' "The rain had just about stopped when we four started down Daphne Street. The elms and maples along the sidewalk was dripping soft, and everybody's gardens was laying still, like something new had happened to them. It smelled good, and like everything outdoors was going to start all over again and be something else, sweeter. "When we got most to Mis' Emmon's gate, I stopped stock still, looking at something shining on the hill. It was Proudfit House, lit up from top to bottom--the big house on the hill that had stood there, blind and dark, for months on end. "'Why, some of the Proudfits must of come home,' I says out loud. "Mis' Emmons answered up, all unexpected to me, for I never knew she knew the Proudfits. 'Mr. Alex Proudfit is coming on to-morrow,' she says. And I sort of resented her that was so near a stranger in the village hearing this about Alex Proudfit before I did, that had known him since he was in knickerbockers. "'Am I keeping the rain off you two people?' Miss Sidney asks as, at the corner, we all turned our backs on Proudfit House. "'Nobody,' Insley says--and his voice was always as smooth and round as wheels running along under his words, 'nobody ever kept the rain off as you are keeping it off, Miss Sidney.' "And, 'I did walked all that way--in that rain,' says Christopher, sleepy, in his automobile's collar. III