se to guess that if she gave any sign of horror he would
only show off the more and tease her. She met him, therefore, on his own
ground.

"Well, you needn't think _we_ want to, because we don't!"

"Oh, they'll show it to you before they screw it down. But I saw it
first!"

For the next forty-eight hours this awful possibility darkened her
delight. For it _was_ a possibility. Grown people did such monstrous
unaccountable things, there was no saying what they might not be up to
next. And here, for once, was an ordeal Clem could not share with her.
He was blind. Alone, if it must be, she must endure it.

She did not feel safe until the coffin had been actually packed in the
hearse and the long procession started. To her dismay, they had parted
her from Clem. He rode in the first coach beside Aunt Hannah and
_vis-a-vis_ with her Uncle Samuel and Cousin Calvin; she in the second
with Mr. Purchase, Peter Benny, and Mr. Tulse the lawyer, a large-headed,
pallid man, with a strong, clean-shaven face and an air of having attended
so many funerals that he paid this one no particular attention.
His careless gentility obviously impressed Mr. Purchase, who mopped his
forehead at half-minute intervals and as frequently remarked that the day
was hot even for the time of year. Mr. Benny was solicitous to know if
Mr. Tulse preferred the window up or down. Mr. Tulse preferred it down,
and took snuff in such profusion that by and by Myra could not distinguish
the floating particles from the dust which entered from the roadway,
stirred up by the feet of the crowd backing to let the carriages pass.
Myra had never seen, never dreamed of, such a crowd. It lined both sides
of the road almost to the church gate--and from Hall to the church was a
good mile and a half; lines of freemasons with their aprons, lines of
foresters in green sashes, lines of coastguards, of fishermen in blue
jerseys crossed with the black-and-white mourning ribbons of the local
Benevolent Club; here and there groups of staring children, some holding
tightly by their mothers' hands; here and there a belated gig, quartering
to give way or falling back to take up its place in the rear of the line.
The sun beat down on the roof of the coach drawing a powerful odour of
camphor from its cushions. For years after the scent of camphor recalled
all the moving pageant and the figure of Mr. Tulse seated in face of her
and abstractedly taking snuff. But at the time