"I'll be back in time," he assured her as he closed the door after him.
"He don't like it a mite," Miss Phosie soliloquized. "I never did see a man so sot against outsiders, unless it be Mil Stevens. Mil can't abide them, though I can't see that they do a namable thing to him. He maintains that they overrun the place and look down on us that belongs here, says they call us Islanders, and they're so high and mighty he calls 'em Highlanders. Well, I don't see that either name hurts much. One's about as good as the other and neither's bad. But Mr. Williams is different. He has a solitary kind of disposition like one of these hermits you read about. I wish I knew why. I wish I knew. There's one thing certain, he sha'n't be put to inconvenience. I'll stand between him and bother if I can."
She shoved her pies into the oven and added another pinch of tea to that already brewing on the stove. The teapot was never empty but stood all day where Cap'n Ben could get a cup of the hot black infusion whenever he came in. Miss Phenie, too, frequently liked to indulge in a draught from the brown teapot.
"They ought to be ready by this time," said Miss Phosie looking up at the clock which was set by sun time and was far ahead of Luther Williams' watch. "I wonder where father is and Ora."
She passed out of the kitchen and on through the pantry into the sitting-room. This was empty though showing the late presence of Cap'n Ben, for his pipe lay on the window-sill and his yesterday's paper was on a chair. Miss Phosie hearing voices in the room beyond, gathered that the family had congregated there. Beyond the sitting-room was the entry, oilcloth covered, chill and clean. From it a straight staircase led to the rooms above. On either side the entry were the best rooms, the parlor opened only on state occasions, and the spare chamber reserved for such particular company as the minister or some such dignitary. It was the spare chamber which Miss Phenie was preparing for the coming boarders, and it was here that Miss Phosie found her sister, her father and her niece Ora.
"Well, I swan, Phosie!" ejaculated Cap'n Ben as his daughter came in. "You ain't come to call us to dinner yet, hev ye?"
"Not yet," Miss Phosie told him. "I wondered where you all were, and I wanted to ask Phenie if I'd better bake two kinds of cake, or if one, with the gingerbread, would do."
"You'd better bake two," said Miss Phenie, putting an added touch to the mantel by setting an advertising calendar thereon. "They say Miss Elliott's quite particular. Father, you'll have to fix that door; it don't latch, and Miss Elliott won't feel safe."
"Wun't?" said Cap'n Ben pulling up his ponderous weight from the chair in which he sat. "I'd like to know who she thinks is going to carry her off. They'd drop her pretty quick if they did ketch her up by mistake, wouldn't they, Ora?"
Ora giggled and stood off to see the effect of the arrangement of the dressing-bureau on which she had placed a very hard, red velvet pincushion, a shell-covered box and an extremely ornate glass vase.