XIII

A Country Chevalier


it was early in August when Mrs. Wealthy Brooks announced her speedy return
from Boston to Edgewood.

"It's jest as well Rose is comin' back," said Mr. Wiley to his wife. "I never
favored her goin' to Boston, where that rosy-posy Claude feller is. When he
was down here he was kep' kind o' tied up in a box-stall, but there he's
caperin' loose round the pastur'."

"I should think Rose would be ashamed to come back, after the way she's
carried on," remarked Mrs. Wiley, "but if she needed punishment I guess she's
got it bein' comp'ny-keeper to Wealthy Ann Brooks. Bein' a church member in
good an' reg'lar standin', I s'pose Wealthy Ann'll go to heaven, but I can
only say that it would be a sight pleasanter place for a good many if she did
n't."

"Rose has be'n foolish an' flirty an' wrong-headed," allowed her grandfather;
"but it won't do no good to treat her like a hardened criminile, same's you
did afore she went away. She ain't hardly got her wisdom teeth cut, in love
affairs! She ain't broke the laws of the State o' Maine, nor any o' the ten
commandments; she ain't disgraced the family, an' there's a chance for her to
reform, seein' as how she ain't twenty year old yet. I was turrible wild an'
hot-headed myself afore you ketched me an' tamed me down."

"You ain't so tame now as I wish you was," Mrs. Wiley replied testily.