Humorous stories; United States -- Social life and customs -- 20th century -- Fiction
"Yes, I didn't look no more. I was suited, so I didn't see no use in
further fussing. I shall tell Gran'ma Mullins to-night and go there
to-morrow. And I may in confidence remark as no howling oasis in a
desert ever howled for joy the way I'll feel like howling when I get my
trunk on a wheelbarrow again. I've spoke for the wheelbarrow at eight
o'clock to-morrow morning, so I'll be over at Lucy's and settled before
you wake up, Mrs. Lathrop."
The next day Susan went, and, surprising as it may seem, Gran'ma Mullins
was singularly content over her going.
"I don't want to make no trouble between friends," said Gran'ma Mullins,
clambering up Mrs. Macy's steps to sit with Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Lathrop.
"But really, Susan is become most changed since her house is begun to be
built over. I wouldn't hardly have known her. I wouldn't say stuck-up
and I wouldn't say airy, but I will say as she's most changed. I
wouldn't say rude, neither, but I didn't consider it exactly friendly to
always either pull her breath in long and loud or else let it out short
and sharp whenever I mentioned Hiram. Hiram is my only legal and natural
child, and with him in the Klondike, and my heart aching and quaking and
breaking for fear the ice'll thaw and let him through into some
unexpected volcano all of a sudden, how can I but mention him? You know
what Hiram is to me, Mrs. Macy. We haven't lived in these two houses for
forty years without your knowing what Hiram is to me. You remember him
as a baby, Mrs. Macy, but you don't, Mrs. Lathrop, so I'll tell you what
Hiram was as a baby. Hiram was a most remarkable--"
When Mrs. Lathrop saw Susan Clegg again, Miss Clegg was looking far from
happy.
"Are you--?" enquired Mrs. Lathrop.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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