tle woman, "a young lady, and Mrs. Solomon Black
is on her way here now."

"With _her_?" gasped the others.

"Yes, she's coming, and she looks to me as if she might have money."

"Who is she?" asked Mrs. Whittle.

"How do I know? Mrs. Mixter's Tommy told my Sam, and he told me, and
I saw Mrs. Black and the boarder coming out of her yard, when I went
out of mine, and I hurried so's to get here first. Hush! Here they
come now."

While the women were conferring many people had entered the room,
although none had purchased the wares. Now there was stark silence
and a concentrated fire of attention as Mrs. Black entered with a
strange young woman. Mrs. Black looked doubtfully important. She, as
a matter of fact, was far from sure of her wisdom in the course she
was taking. She was even a little pale, and her lips moved nervously
as she introduced the girl to one and another. "Miss Orr," she said;
sometimes "Miss Lydia Orr."

As for the girl, she looked timid, yet determined. She was pretty,
perhaps a beauty, had she made the most of her personal advantages
instead of apparently ignoring them. Her beautiful fair hair, which
had red-gold lights, should have shaded her forehead, which was too
high. Instead it was drawn smoothly back, and fastened in a mat of
compact flat braids at the back of her head. She was dressed very
simply, in black, and her costume was not of the latest mode.

"I don't see anything about her to have made Mrs. Fulsom think she
was rich," Mrs. Whittle whispered to Mrs. Daggett, who made an
unexpectedly shrewd retort: "I can see. She don't look as if she
cared what anybody thought of her clothes; as if she had so much
she's never minded."

Mrs. Whittle failed to understand. She grunted non-assent. "I don't
see," said she. "Her sleeves are way out of date."

For awhile there was a loud buzz of conversation all over the room.
Then it ceased, for things were happening, amazing things. The
strange young lady was buying and she was paying cash down. Some of
the women examined the bank notes suspiciously and handed them to
their husbands to verify. The girl saw, and flushed, but she
continued. She went from table to table, and she bought everything,
from quilts and hideous drawn-in rugs to frosted cakes. She bought in
the midst of that ominous hush of suspicion. Once she even heard a
woman hiss to another, "She's crazy. She got out of an insane
asylum."

However nobody of all the stunned throng ref