And Mrs. Alexander's view was the one held by most of the Oldfield ladies, all of whom took the incomprehensible affair much to heart. Only Miss Judy and Kitty Mills saw nothing to alarm, nothing to wonder at, nothing in the least unnatural in Anne's change of attitude. But then, Miss Judy was well known to believe that everybody always had some praiseworthy motive for everything, if others were only clear-sighted enough to perceive it. Her pure mind was a flawless crystal, reflecting every ray of light from many exquisite prisms, but sending nothing out of actual darkness. And no one ever regarded seriously the views of Kitty Mills, who was notoriously willing for every one to do precisely as he liked, as nearly as he could, without any explanation or any reason whatever, so that her opinion had the very slight value which usually pertains to the opinions of the easily pleased. All the other Oldfield ladies were too deeply shocked, too utterly amazed, to know what to think, or what to say, or what to do. They could only gather in solemn, excited conclave at one another's houses, and discuss the situation daily and almost hourly, with growing wonder and bated breath. Sidney was, of course, the central figure in this, as in all other things vital to the life of the village. As much at a loss for once as the dullest, she held nevertheless to her high esteem for Anne, and in canvassing the strangeness of the latter's conduct from house to house, as she felt compelled to canvass it, she invariably spoke of her with great kindness, even while admitting that it would be hard for a Philadelphia lawyer to find out what Anne meant by whirling round like a weathercock. It is likely that Sidney took off her bonnet and let down her hair oftener, and shook it out harder, and twisted it up tighter, at this time, than at any other period of her entire professional career. She used, indeed, to stop all along the big road--anywhere--and hang her bonnet on the fence, while she shook her hair down and twisted it up again; and her knitting-needles flew faster than they had ever done before or ever did afterward. One day, as she happened to be entering the doctor's gate to keep an important engagement with Mrs. Alexander, she saw Miss Pettus standing before the Watson house, gazing at the window,--which had now become the stage of a mystery play,--and not only gazing, but staring as if some dreadful sight had suddenly turned her to stone. Sidney called to her, but she did not turn or respond in any way for some minutes; and when she finally joined Sidney and the doctor's wife on the latter's porch, where they were sitting, she was really pale from agitation and actually sputtering with excitement. "Chips!" she gasped, sinking into a chair. "Poker chips. I saw 'em with my own eyes and heard 'em with my own ears! I give you both my sacred word as a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church in good standing."