“She gives _me_ the shivers right enough, anyway!” Mrs. James broke out, laughing nervously, and casting yet another glance at the dreaded door. “It’s that smile of hers ... and the way she watches to see what you’re at! There’s something at the back of her mind as sneers and laughs at you all the time.... As for yon tag of hers about knowing your own business best, all I can say is it fair makes me want to scream!” “I’ve known a many as was feared of Emma,” Mrs. Tanner followed on; “parson’s wife, for one—ay, and parson an’ all! I’ve seen district visitors and suchlike coming out of yon house looking for all the world like a bit o’ chewed string. Ay, and one day—yon time when parson had a curate as was more than a shade soft—I see him come shambling down t’ steps fair crying and wringing his hands. I was in t’ street at the time, clipping yon bit of box we have at the door, and he stopped alongside of me, and said, ‘Mrs. Tanner, that woman’s a devil!’ I was fair took aback by such language, as you might think; but when I looked up there was Emma smiling behind her ferns, and watching yon snivelling lad like a cat wi’ a half-dead mouse. It was so like the way she carried on wi’ Poor Stephen, it fair give me a turn; so for Stephen’s sake I took curate into t’ house and give him a cup o’ tea and all the gossip I could lay my tongue to, and sent him off home with Emma clean out of his mind, and chuckling as throng as a laying hen!” “There’s only one as has never taken much count of her,” Mrs. Airey said, when they had stopped laughing about the curate, “and that’s Martha Jane Fell. I’ve heard her reeling off stuff at Emma as just made you catch your breath, and Emma’s smile getting lesser and lesser with every minute. Ay, and I’ve seen her bolt into yon house like a rabbit into its hole, just to get away from her long tongue!” “’Tisn’t to be expected Martha Jane should have fine feelings same as us!”... Young Mrs. James tossed her head with a fiercely virtuous air. Being acquainted only by hearsay with the informalities of Martha Jane’s past, she naturally supposed them to be more momentous than was actually the case. Nor were the rest of the Chorus averse to encouraging her in this supposition. The post still lagged, and the time had to be passed; so presently they were drawn nearer and nearer in the road, lowering their voices and nodding their shocked heads. Mrs. Clapham kept saying—“For shame, now!” and “Can’t you let sleeping dogs lie?” breaking every now and then into her hearty laugh. “I must say, though, I do think I’ve more claim to that house than her!” she added, after a while, getting hungry for fresh encouragement as there was still no sign of the post.