questions, broodingly.

"I suppose you'll want to sell out, Rose," Nellie's husband, Bert
Mall, big and cordial as Peter had been before him, suggested a
day or two after the funeral. "I'll try to get you a buyer, or
would you rather rent?"

"I haven't any plans yet, Bert," Mrs. Wade had evaded adroitly,
"it's all happened so quickly. I have plenty of time and there
are lots of things to be seen to." There had been that in her
voice which had forbidden discussion, and it was a tone to which
she was forced to have recourse more than once during the
following days when it seemed to her that all her friends were in
a conspiracy to persuade her to a hasty, ill-advised upheaval.

Nothing, she resolved, should push her from this farm or into
final decisions until a year had passed. She must have something
to which she could cling if it were nothing more than a familiar
routine. Without that to sustain and support her, she felt she
could never meet the responsibilities which had suddenly
descended, with such a terrific impact, upon her shoulders.

In an inexplicable way, these new burdens, her black dress--the
first silk one since the winter before Billy came--and the
softening folds of her veil, all invested her with a new and
touching majesty that seemed to set her a little apart from her
neighbors.

Nellie had been frankly scandalized at the idea of mourning.
"Nobody does that out here--exceptin' during the services," she