Miss Pickett gave her companion a quick resentful glance, which was followed by one of triumph directed at the dust that was collecting on the shoulders of the best black cashmere; then she looked at the bag on the front seat, and suddenly felt illuminated with the suspicion that Mrs. Flagg had secretly made preparations to pass the night in Baxter. The bag looked plump, as if it held much more than the pocket-book and the jelly. Mrs. Flagg looked up with unusual humility. “I did think about that jelly,” she said, as if Miss Pickett had openly reproached her. “I was afraid it might look as if I was tryin’ to pay Nancy for her kindness.” “Well, I don’t know,” said Cynthia; “I guess she’d been pleased. She’d thought you just brought her over a little present: but I don’ know as ’twould been any good to her after all; she’d thought so much of it, comin’ from you, that she’d kep’ it till ’twas all candied.” But Mrs. Flagg didn’t look exactly pleased by this unexpected compliment, and her fellow-traveler colored with confusion and a sudden feeling that she had shown undue forwardness. Presently they remembered the Beckett house, to their great relief, and, as they approached, Mrs. Flagg reached over and moved her handbag from the front seat to make room for another passenger. But nobody came out to stop the stage, and they saw the unexpected guest sitting by one of the front windows comfortably swaying a palm-leaf fan, and rocking to and fro in calm content. They shrank back into their corners, and tried not to be seen. Mrs. Flagg’s face grew very red. “She got in, didn’t she?” said Miss Pickett, snipping her words angrily, as if her lips were scissors. Then she heard a call, and bent forward to see Mrs. Beckett herself appear in the front doorway, very smiling and eager to stop the stage. The driver was only too ready to stop his horses. “Got a passenger for me to carry back, ain’t ye?” said he facetiously. “Them ’s the kind I like; carry both ways, make somethin’ on a double trip,” and he gave Mrs. Flagg and Miss Pickett a friendly wink as he stepped down over the wheel. Then he hurried toward the house, evidently in a hurry to put the baggage on; but the expected passenger still sat rocking and fanning at the window. “No, sir; I ain’t got any passengers,” exclaimed Mrs. Beckett, advancing a stop or two to meet him, and speaking very loud in her pleasant excitement. “This lady that come this morning wants her large trunk with her summer things that she left to the depot in Woodville. She’s very desirous to git into it, so don’t you go an’ forgit; ain’t you got a book or somethin’, Mr. Ma’sh? Don’t you forgit to make a note of it; here’s her check, an’ we’ve kep’ the number in case you should mislay it or anything. There’s things in the trunk she needs; you know how you overlooked stoppin’ to the milliner’s for my bunnit last week.”