y.

Evelina glanced from one to the other. "Mr. Ramy HAS been sick," she
said at length, as though to show that she also was in a position to
speak with authority. "He's complained very frequently of headaches."

"Ho!--I know him," said Mrs. Hochmuller with a laugh, her eyes still on
the clock-maker. "Ain't you ashamed of yourself, Ramy?"

Mr. Ramy, who was looking at his plate, said suddenly one word which the
sisters could not understand; it sounded to Ann Eliza like "Shwike."

Mrs. Hochmuller laughed again. "My, my," she said, "wouldn't you think
he'd be ashamed to go and be sick and never dell me, me that nursed him
troo dat awful fever?"

"Yes, I SHOULD," said Evelina, with a spirited glance at Ramy; but he
was looking at the sausages that Linda had just put on the table.

When dinner was over Mrs. Hochmuller invited her guests to step out of
the kitchen-door, and they found themselves in a green enclosure, half
garden, half orchard. Grey hens followed by golden broods clucked under
the twisted apple-boughs, a cat dozed on the edge of an old well, and
from tree to tree ran the network of clothes-line that denoted Mrs.
Hochmuller's calling. Beyond the apple trees stood a yellow summer-house
festooned with scarlet runners; and below it, on the farther side of
a rough fence, the land dipped down, holding a bit of woodland in
its hollow. It was all strangely sweet and still on that hot Sunday
afternoon, and as she moved across the grass under the apple-boughs Ann
Eliza thought of quiet afternoons in church, and of the hymns her mother
had sung to her when she was a baby.

Evelina was more restless. She wandered from the well to the
summer-house and back, she tossed crumbs to the chickens and disturbed
the cat with arch caresses; and at last she expressed a desire to go
down into the wood.

"I guess you got to go round by the road, then," said Mrs. Hochmuller.
"My Linda she goes troo a hole in de fence, but I guess you'd tear your
dress if you was to dry."

"I'll help you," said Mr. Ramy; and guided by Linda the pair walked
along the fence till they reached a narrow gap in its boards. Through
this they disappeared, watched curiously in their descent by the
grinning Linda, while Mrs. Hochmuller and Ann Eliza were left alone in
the summer-house.

Mrs. Hochmuller looked at her guest with a confidential smile. "I guess
dey'll be gone quite a while," she remarked, jerking her double chin
toward the gap in the fen