But at whom do you suppose she looked? Not me! Miss Chester! That was
cold tub number two for that day, and I didn't react as quickly as I
might, but when I did I was in the proper glow all over. When I revived
and saw the lovely pale blush on her face I felt like a cabbage-rose
beside a tea-bud. I was glad Aunt Adeline came out on the porch just
then so I could go in and tell Judy to bring out the iced tea and cakes.
When I came from the kitchen I stepped into my room and took out one of
Alfred's letters from the desk drawer and opened it at random, as you do
the Bible when you want to decide things, and put my finger down on a
line with my eyes shut This was what it was:

"--and all these years I have walked the world, blindfolded to its
loveliness with the blackness that came to me when I found that you--"


I didn't read any more, but shoved it back in a hurry and went on out on
the porch, comforted in a way, but feeling some more in sympathy with
Mrs Johnson than I had before Aunt Bettie and her guest from Washington
had interrupted our algebraic demonstration on the man subject. You
can't always be sure of the right answer to X in any proposition of
life; that is, a woman can't!

And, furthermore, I didn't like that next hour much, just as a sample of
life, for instance. Aunt Bettie had got her joining-together humor well
started, and right there before my face she made a present of every nice
man in Hillsboro to that lovely, distinguished, strange girl who could
have slipped through a bucket hoop if she had tried hard. I had to sit
there, listen to the presentations, watch her drink two tall delicious
glasses of tea full of sugar and consume without fear three of Judy's