she had a tale for him which charmed his ears. "I didn't know
where to look," she said. "Aunt Emmie, you know, has a very bad trick
of coming into my room without knocking. Well, in she walked last night,
and found me before the glass PRACTISING MY CURTSEY! I could have killed
her. Pretended she thought I was out."

"Dora, would you like ME to promise something?" he asked, with a
mischievous look.

"Of course, I would. I don't care how much YOU promise. What?"

But already he repented of his daring, and sat beside her suddenly
conscious and abashed. Nor could any teasing prevail to draw from him
what had been on his audacious lips to say.

Social precedents are easily established in the country. The accident
that sent the first Liberal canvasser for Jordanville votes to the Crow
place for his supper would be hard to discover now; the fact remains
that he has been going there ever since. It made a greater occasion than
Mrs Crow would ever have dreamed of acknowledging. She saw to it that
they had a good meal of victuals, and affected indifference to the
rest; they must say their say, she supposed. If the occasion had one
satisfaction which she came nearer to confessing than another, it was
that the two or three substantial neighbours who usually came to meet
the politicians left their wives at home, and that she herself, to avoid
giving any offence on this score, never sat down with the men. Quite
enough to do it was, she would explain later, for her and the hired girl
to wait on them and to clear up after them. She and Bella had their
bite afterward when the men had hitched up, and when they could exchange
comments of proud congratulation upon the inroads on the johnny-cake or
the pies. So there was no ill feeling, and Mrs Crow, having vindicated
her dignity by shaking hands with the guests of the evening in the
parlour, solaced it further by maintaining the masculine state of the
occasion, in spite of protests or entreaties. To sit down opposite Mr
Crow would have made it ordinary "company"; she passed the plates and
turned it into a function.

She was waiting for them on the parlour sofa when Crow brought them in
out of the nipping early dark of December, Elmore staying behind in the
yard with the horses. She sat on the sofa in her best black dress with
the bead trimming on the neck and sleeves, a good deal pushed up
and wrinkled across the bosom, which had done all that would ever be
required of it when it gave