across the road from us."

"You will have to make up the old quarrel, Susan. It will never do to
be at outs with your neighbours."

"Cousin Sophia began the quarrel, so she can begin the making up also,
Mrs. Dr. dear," said Susan loftily. "If she does I hope I am a good
enough Christian to meet her half-way. She is not a cheerful person and
has been a wet blanket all her life. The last time I saw her, her face
had a thousand wrinkles--maybe more, maybe less--from worrying and
foreboding. She howled dreadful at her first husband's funeral but she
married again in less than a year. The next note, I see, describes the
special service in our church last Sunday night and says the
decorations were very beautiful."

"Speaking of that reminds me that Mr. Pryor strongly disapproves of
flowers in church," said Miss Cornelia. "I always said there would be
trouble when that man moved here from Lowbridge. He should never have
been put in as elder--it was a mistake and we shall live to rue it,
believe me! I have heard that he has said that if the girls continue to
'mess up the pulpit with weeds' that he will not go to church."

"The church got on very well before old Whiskers-on-the-moon came to
the Glen and it is my opinion it will get on without him after he is
gone," said Susan.

"Who in the world ever gave him that ridiculous nickname?" asked Mrs.
Blythe.

"Why, the Lowbridge boys have called him that ever since I can
remember, Mrs. Dr. dear--I suppose because his face is so round and
red, with that fringe of sandy whisker about it. It does not do for
anyone to call him that in his hearing, though, and that you may tie
to. But worse than his whiskers, Mrs. Dr. dear, he is a very
unreasonable man and has a great many queer ideas. He is an elder now
and they say he is very religious; but I can well remember the time,
Mrs. Dr. dear, twenty years ago, when he was caught pasturing his cow
in the Lowbridge graveyard. Yes, indeed, I have not forgotten that, and
I always think of it when he is praying in meeting. Well, that is all
the notes and there is not much else in the paper of any importance. I
never take much interest in foreign parts. Who is this Archduke man who
has been murdered?"

"What does it matter to us?" asked Miss Cornelia, unaware of the
hideous answer to her question which destiny was even then preparing.
"Somebody is always murdering or being murdered in those Balkan States.
It's their normal condition and I