the machinery. That's what he said. And he said the seasickness would
do her good, any way. I'm sure I don't want her to be sick any more
than you do, Maria." He added this like one who has been unjustly put
upon his defense.

They now both remained silent, the woman rocking herself and fanning,
and the old man holding his fingers suspended from their drubbing upon
the table, and looking miserably from the woman in the rocking-chair
to the girl at the window, as if a strict inquiry into the present
situation might convict him of it in spite of his innocence. The girl
still sat with her face turned from them, and still from time to time
she put her handkerchief to her eyes and wiped away the tears. The
locust in the maple began again, and shrilled inexorably. Suddenly
the girl leaped to her feet.

"There's the stage!" she cried, with a tumult in her voice and manner,
and a kind of choking sob. She showed, now that she stood upright, the
slim and elegant shape which is the divine right of American girlhood,
clothed with the stylishness that instinctive taste may evoke, even in
a hill town, from study of paper patterns, Harper's Bazar, and the
costume of summer boarders. Her dress was carried with spirit and
effect.

"Lydia Blood!" cried the other woman, springing responsively to her
feet, also, and starting toward the girl, "don't you go a step without
you feel just like it! Take off your things this minute and stay, if
you wouldn't jus' as lives go. It's hard enough to _have_ you go,
child, without seemin' to force you!"

"Oh, aunt Maria," answered the girl, piteously, "it almost kills me to