Mrs. Tomkins gazed at her sewing with thoughtful pleasure. "It was a
hard blow to him," she said. "He did his best. Maybe he was a little
queer. But he harmed no one. He used to tell the children stories.

"How is Mrs. Grumble," she asked, "to-day?"

"Weak," said Mrs. Ploughman; "very weak, out of her mind part of the
time with the fever."

"Do you calculate she'll die, Mrs. Ploughman?"

"I don't know. But I don't calculate she'll live, Mrs. Tomkins.
Still, we must hope for the best. This is the way it was; first the
influenza, and then the pneumony. Double pneumony, the doctor says.
There's a lot of it around again, like last year. It takes the young
and the hardy. It won't get me. No.

"There's nothing to do for it," she added, "nothing, that is, beyond
nursing."

"If it wasn't for Mrs. Wicket," said Mrs. Tomkins, "I expect she'd have
been dead before this. Mrs. Wicket's a capable woman in things like
that. Capabler than Miss Beal. There was no one else ever made me so
comfortable. I have to say that about her; Mrs. Grumble's getting the
best of care. And I'm looking after Juliet. Not that she's any
trouble; she's as quiet as a mouse, playing all day long with her
dolls."

But Mrs. Ploughman could not find it in her heart to forgive Mrs.
Wicket for having been the cause of her grandson Noel's death. "Yes,"