I hadn't thought there was anything wrong in my coming from the station
at that time of night with a strange man until I saw the look on Miss
Susanna's face when I told her I had done it. If I had been a brand
snatched from the burning I could not have been folded to her bosom
with more fervent thanksgiving or a more pained expression, and at
first, still not understanding, I thought I had done right off the
worst thing a person could do in Twickenham Town. I had walked a long
way with a man who didn't have ancestors, perhaps. He had seemed all
right to me, and I was awfully glad to have him, as otherwise I might
have had to sit on my suit-case all night, for I certainly couldn't
have come up with the man who swung a lantern, and he was the only
other white one in sight. But I found out later it wasn't lack of
ancestors that caused the sudden chill which fell over us when I
mentioned Mr. Eppes's name. It was something else and--oh, my
granny!--the look that pretty little pink-and-white person gave me when
I said what I had done!

"Oh, my dear, my dear!" Miss Susanna put her arms around me as if I
were a little ewe lamb that had been lost and was found, and in the
moonlight her beautiful little wrinkles reddened as if she were
responsible for a most grievous calamity, "To think of your being alone
at a public station at this time of night! A young girl! And I had
promised your mother to take such good care of you! I wouldn't have
had such a thing occur for--"

"There hasn't anything occurred." I took off my hat and fanned hard
and then followed Miss Susanna up-stairs into a big square room with a
big tester bed in it, and if she hadn't been looking at me I would have
climbed up in it and gone to sleep in my clothes, I was so tired; but
she didn't leave me for some time. She couldn't get over my walking