before," she whispered, in a last attempt at discipline, "that you should n't talk about nightgowns and stockings and — things like that, in a loud tone of voice, and especially when there's men folks round?"
"I know, mother, I know, and I won't. All I want to say is" — here Mr. Cobb gave a cluck, slapped the reins, and the horses started sedately on their daily task — "all I want to say is that it is a journey when" — the stage was really under way now and Rebecca had to put her head out of the window over the door in order to finish her sentence — "it is a journey when you carry a nightgown!"
The objectionable word, uttered in a high treble, floated back to the offended ears of Mrs. Randall, who watched the stage out of sight, gathered up her packages from the bench at the store door, and stepped into the wagon that had been standing at the hitching-post. As she turned the horse's head towards home she rose to her feet for a moment, and shading her eyes with her hand, looked at a cloud of dust in the dim distance.
"Mirandy 'll have her hands full, I guess," she said to herself; "but I should n't wonder if it would be the making of Rebecca."
All this had been half an hour ago, and the sun, the heat, the dust, the contemplation of errands to be done in the great metropolis of Milltown, had
