Mary remembered that Billy would not come if it rained, and with a
sigh she noticed that the clouds were dark and threatening. They now
entered the kitchen, which was a long, low, narrow room, with a
fireplace on the right, and two windows opposite, looking towards the
west. The floor was painted and very clean, but the walls were
unfinished, and the brown rafters were festooned with cobwebs. In the
middle of the room, the supper table was standing, but there was
nothing homelike in the arrangement of the many colored dishes and
broken knives and forks, neither was there any thing tempting to one's
appetite in the coarse brown bread and white-looking butter. Mary was
very tired with holding Alice so long, and sinking into a chair near
the window, she would have cried; but there was a tightness in her
throat, and a pressure about her head and eyes, which kept the tears
from flowing. She had felt so once before. Twas when she stood at her
mother's grave; and now as the room grew dark, and the objects around
began to turn in circles, she pressed her hands tightly to her
forehead, and said, 'Oh, I hope I shan't faint."

"To be sure you won't," said a loud, harsh voice, and instantly large
drops of water were thrown in her face, while the same voice
continued: "You don't have such spells often, I hope, for Lord knows I
don't want any more fitty ones here."

"No, ma'am," said Mary, meekly; and looking up, she saw before her a
tall, square-backed, masculine-looking woman, who wore a very short
dress, and a very high-crowned cap, fastened under her chin with bows
of sky-blue ribbon.

Mary knew she was indebted to this personage for the shower bath, for