"I don't think Susan's very well," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Maybe she's worried over Jathrop," suggested Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Lathrop said nothing. She just rocked. VIII SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CYCLONE "I d'n know, I'm sure, what star this town could ever have been laid out under," said Susan Clegg, one exceptionally hot night as the four friends sat out on Mrs. Macy's steps, "but my own opinion is as it must have been a comet, for we're always skiting along into some sort of hot water. When it ain't all of us, it's some of us, and when it ain't some of us, it's one of us, and now the walls of my house is up I'd be willing to bet a nickel as a calamity'll happen along just because something's always happening here and my walls is the youngest and tenderest thing in the community now." "Your roof ain't--" began Mrs. Lathrop. "Of course not; how could it be, when my walls is only just up? I don't wish to be casting no stones at him as is the least among us, but I will say, Mrs. Lathrop, as Jathrop's orders seem to be taking you up under the loving protection of their wings, while I'm running around like I was a viper without no warm bosom to hatch me. _Your_ walls have been up and a-doing for a week, but my walls have been sitting around waiting until I was nigh to put out. To see your laths going in and your plaster going on, while I stay lumber and nails, is a lesson in yielding to the will of heaven as I never calculated on. There's few things more aggravating than to see some other house speeding along while your own house sits silently, patiently waiting. Of course I can't say nothing, as even the boy as carries water knows my house is going to be a present to me in the end. It's all right, and likely enough the Lord has seen fit to send this summer to me as a chastisement; but I will say that if I'd known how this summer was going, the Lord would most certainly have had to plan some other way to punish me. I don't say as it wasn't natural that your walls should go up first, Jathrop being your son, and, now that he's rich, no more to me than a benefactor--" "Oh, Susan!" expostulated Mrs. Macy. "That's what he is, Mrs. Macy; he's my benefactor, and I can't escape if I want to. You may tend a man's mother ten years, day and night, house cleanings and cistern cleanings, moths and the well froze up, and if the man comes back rich, he's your benefactor." "Susan!" cried Mrs. Lathrop, "you--"