"But if you weren't postmistress what would you think?" Ingram queried.
"Wouldn't think anything; I'd know they'd skip! They'll skip to-night; mark my words."
"Oh, but they won't," said Alva, smiling; "they'll pay their bill—wait and see."
"Yes, I will wait and see," said Mrs. Ray, darkly. "I'll wait a long while and see very little. Yes, indeed. What sticks in my mind is poor Sammy Adams. He says he's afraid to sleep alone in his house, and he's too afraid of dogs and cats to have any to watch. He's going to put two hens in his kitchen to-night and roll a sofa against the front door. He says he knows every time the hens stir he'll go most out of his senses. Sammy says he wasn't meant to live alone."
"What did you say to that?"
"Said it didn't look to me as if he was meant to live with hens, neither. But where is your husband, Nellie?" (Mrs. O'Neil had just re-entered the room). "I've got to get hold of him. I'm in a awful hurry to get home. There's the mail, and I've got Sally Catt's dress to finish, too."
"He'll be in in just a minute," said Mrs. O'Neil; "did Sally decide to line it, after all?"
"No, she didn't decide to line it; but she decided to have me line it, which is more to my point. I'm sure I'm glad not to be Joey Beall and have to adapt myself to Sally; but then, if folks are still calling a fellow Joey after he's forty, I don't know that it matters much who marries him, and Sally hasn't changed her mind as to liking the house on the hill since he moved it up on the hill to please her."
"I'm sorry for Joey," said Mrs. O'Neil, warmly.
"Well, I'm not," said Mrs. Ray. "I'm not sorry for any one who's a fool. Speaking of fools, if they don't pay to-morrow, how much longer are you intending to keep them for nothing? I'd just like to know that."