e's been married twice,--run away
the first time. My land! what a stir there was about it, and what a high
hoss the Colonel rode. Who her second was nobody knows,--some scamp by
the name of Smith,--that's your name, and a good one, too, but about the
commonest in the world, I reckon. There's four John Smiths in town, and
Joel Smith, who brings my milk, and George Smith I buy aigs of, and
forty odd more. They say the Colonel hates the name like pisen. Won't
have anybody work for him by that name. Dismissed his milkman because he
was a Smith, and between you and I, I b'lieve half his opposition to you
was your name. Why, it's like a red rag to a bull."

"I didn't know he was opposed to me personally," Eloise said, and Mrs.
Biggs replied, "Of course not; how could he be? He never seen you. It's
the normal, and bein' put out of office--he and Ruby Ann. They've run
things long enough. They say he did swear offel at the last school
meetin' about normals and ingrates and all that,--meanin' they'd forgot
all he'd done for 'em; but, my land, you can't b'lieve half you hear. I
don't b'lieve nothin', and try to keep a close mouth 'bout what I do
b'lieve. I ain't none o' your gossips, and won't have folks sayin' the
Widder Biggs said so and so."

Here Mrs. Biggs stopped to take breath and answer a rap at the kitchen
door, where George Smith was standing with a basket of eggs. Eloise
could hear her badgering him because he charged too much and because his
hens did not lay larger eggs, and threatening to withdraw her patronage
if there was not a change. Then items of the latest news were exchanged,
Mrs. Biggs doing her part well for one who never repeated anything and
never believed anything. When George Smith was gone she returned to her
seat by Eloise and resumed her conversation, which had been interrupted,
and which was mostly reminiscent of people and incidents in Crompton,
and especially of the Crompton House and its occupants, with a second
fling at Ruby Ann.

CHAPTER VIII

MRS. BIGGS'S REMINISCENCES

"Maybe I was too hard on Ruby Ann," she said, measuring the heel of
Tim's sock to see if it were time to begin to narrow. "She's a pretty
clever woman, take her by and large, but I do hate to see a dog frisk
like a puppy, and she's thirty-five if she's a day. You see, I know,
'cause, as I was tellin' you, there was her and me and Amy Crompton
girls together. I am forty, Amy is thirty-eight or thirty-nine, and Ruby
A