It was a novel situation in which the stranger found himself, seated at
that table with Eudora presiding and Mandy Ann waiting upon them, her
tray a dinner-plate which she flourished rather conspicuously. He was
quick to observe and nothing escaped him, from the improvised
candlesticks to the napkin by his china plate. He knew it was a
handkerchief, and smiled inwardly as he wondered what Tom Hardy would
say if he could see him now. The old lady was not at the table. Mandy
Ann had managed that and attended to her in her chair, but as if eating
brightened her faculties, she began to look about her and talk, and ask
why she couldn't sit at her own table.

"'Case thar's a gemman hyar an' you draps yer vittles so," Mandy Ann
said in a whisper, with her lips close to the old woman's ear.

"Gentleman? Who's he? Whar's he from?" the old woman asked--forgetting
that she had spoken to him.

"I told you oncet he's Miss Dory's frien' an' from de Norf. Do be
quiet," Mandy Ann blew into the deaf ears.

"From the Nawth. I don't like the Nawth, 'case I--" the old lady began,
but Mandy Ann choked her with a muffin, and she did not finish her
sentence and tell why she disliked the North.

Eudora's face was scarlet, but she did not interfere. Her grandmother
was in better hands than hers, and more forceful.

"Granny is queer sometimes," she said by way of apology, while her
guest bowed in token that he understood, and the meal proceeded in quiet
with one exception. Granny was choked with eating too fast, and Mandy