"Nevertheless," said Temperance, "you'd just better stay for supper. What would Sarah ever think if I didn't feed you? Take off your coat, Miss Sherman. And Gus, you can dump that busted glass out on the ash pile." Smiling again, Early Ann tossed her hat and coat over a chair, tied an apron about her waist, and with the uncanny instinct of one woman in another woman's kitchen began to set the table and to help get supper. Watching the girl, Temperance sighed. She felt old and tired today. She had never inherited a farm, and never in her life had she had such a peaches-and-cream complexion as Early Ann's. She wished she might have a girl like this one to help her about the house. She supposed that Miss Sherman wouldn't be working any more now that she had come into property, and she put the question to the newly made heiress. "You bet I'll go on working," said Early Ann. "I'm going to save my money. Except enough for some dresses and maybe a two-week trip to Chicago." "Are you going to Chicago all by yourself?" asked the horrified Temperance. But Early Ann had made up her mind that she had told the town gossip more than enough. Gus returned from the ash pile and settled himself in the kitchen rocker with a copy of the "Modern Priscilla" replete with corset advertisements, while Peter loudly announced that if he were taking Early Ann to the movies he would have to shave. "Shave," scoffed Early Ann. "Let's see...." She ran her fingers over the soft down which covered his cheeks. "Pin feathers," she said. Peter ignored her. He dipped hot water from the reservoir at the end of the stove, examined his beard critically in the mirror, and began to lather in a business-like manner. He wished that Maxine might see him now. * * * * * Upstairs, Old Mrs. Crandall lay in her bed wondering what it was that had shaken the house a few minutes before. After a time she smelled coffee and knew that there must be company. Temperance and Peter always drank tea for supper. Deaf and bed-ridden, the old woman still kept in touch with the world with her other senses. Through a rift in the trees she could see the front of the Methodist Episcopal church and in through one of the basement windows. She knew what went on in the elderberry bushes to the south of the church, and she had seen a flash of Kate Barton's red dress through the blinds of the belfry last Thursday and had seen the pigeons and sparrows come out in dreadful fright. You couldn't tell Mrs. Crandall that Kate was practicing and Joe Whalen pumping the organ that afternoon. Mrs. Pat O'Toole looked to be about five months along with her ninth. Peter Brailsford, from the way he was mooning around, was certainly in love, probably with Maxine Larabee.