en a knock on the open kitchen door checked her.

Neither mother nor daughter glanced up in answer to the knock. Mrs.
Hershey resolutely kept her eyes on her caldron as she turned her big
spoon about in it, and Lizzie, with sullen, averted face, industriously
cut her loaf.

A second knock, followed by the appearance of a good-looking,
well-dressed young man on the threshold, met with the same reception.
Tillie, in the background, and hidden by the stove, looked on
wonderingly.

The young man glanced, in evident mystification, at the woman by the
stove and at the girl at the table, and a third time rapped loudly.

"Good afternoon!" he said pleasantly, an inquiring note in his voice.

Mrs. Hershey and Lizzie went on with their work as though they had not
heard him.

He took a step into the room, removing his hat. "You were expecting me
this afternoon, weren't you?" he asked.

"This is the place," Lizzie remarked at last.

"You were looking for me?" he repeated.

Mrs. Hershey suddenly turned upon Lizzie. "Why don't you speak?" she
inquired half-tauntingly. "You spoke BEFORE."

Tillie realized that Sister Jennie must be referring to Lizzie's
readiness at market that morning to "speak," in making her agreement
with the young man for board.

"You spoke this morning," the mother repeated. "Why can't you speak
now?"

"Och, why don't you speak yourself?" retorted Lizzie. "It ain't fur ME
to speak!"

The stranger appeared to recognize that he was the subject of a
domestic unpleasantness.

"You find it inconvenient to take me to board?" he hesitatingly
inquired of Mrs. Hershey. "I shouldn't think of wishing to intrude.
There is a hotel in the place, I suppose?"

"Yes. There IS a HOtel in New Canaan."

"I can get board there, no doubt?"

"Well," Mrs. Hershey replied argumentatively, "that's a public house
and this ain't. We never made no practice of takin' boarders. To be
sure, Jonas he always was FUR boarders. But I AIN'T fur!"

"Oh, yes," gravely nodded the young man. "Yes. I see."

He picked up the dress-suit case which he had set on the sill. "Where
is the hotel, may I ask?"

"Just up the road a piece. You can see the sign out," said Mrs.
Hershey, while Lizzie banged the bread-box shut with an energy forcibly
expressive of her feelings.

"Thank you," responded the gentleman, a pair of keen, bright eyes
sweeping Lizzie's gloomy face.

He bowed, put his hat on his head and stepped out of the house.