had been the babel of voices, a discouraged
fragment of comb, a tin basin, a slippery atom of soap, these Eudora
proffered with an unction worthy of better things. "I declare Mist' Chugg
have scarce left any soap, an' I don't believe thar's 'nother bit in the
house." Eudora's accent was but faintly reminiscent of her mother's strong
Smoky Mountain dialect, as a crude feature is sometimes softened in the
second generation. It was not unpleasing on her full, rosy mouth. The girl
had the seductiveness of her half-sister, Judith, without a hint of
Judith's spiritual quality.

Mary told her not to mind about the soap, and went to fetch her hand-bag,
which, consistent with the democratic spirit of its surroundings, was
resting against a clump of sage-brush, whither it had been lifted by
Chugg. Miss Carmichael's individual toilet service, which was neither
handsome nor elaborate, impressed Eudora far more potently in ranking Mary
as a personage than did her dignity of office as "gov'ment."

"I reckon you-uns must have seen Sist' Judy up to Miz Dax's. I hope she
war lookin' right well." There was in the inquiry an unmistakable note of
pride. The connection was plainly one to be flaunted. Judith, with her
gentle bearing and her simple, convent accomplishments, was plainly the
_grande dame_ of the family. Eudora had now divested herself of the
greasy, flour-smeared apron, flinging it under the wash-bench with a
single all-sufficient movement, while Mary's look was directed towards her
dressing-bag. In glancing up to make some remark about Judith, Mary was
confronted by a radiant apparition whose lilac calico skirts looked fresh
from the iron.

At the side of the house languished a wretched, abortive garden, running
over with weeds and sage-brush, and here a man pottered with the
purposeless energy of old age, working with an ear cocked in the direction
of the house, as he turned a spade of earth again and again in hopeless,
pusillanimous industry. But when his strained attention was presently
rewarded by a shouted summons to supper, and he stood erect but for the
slouching droop of shoulders that was more a matter of temperament than of
age, one saw a tall man of massive build, whose keen glance and slightly
grizzled hair belied his groping, ineffectual labor. The head, and face
were finely modelled. Unless nature had fashioned them in some vagrant,
prankish mood, such elegance of line betokened prior generations in which
gentl