"Oh, sell it, of course."
She was horrified. "Sell it? To whom?"
"Oh, to anybody who'll buy it."
"Sell that darling old house, and those glorious elms. Sell that beautiful leaded-glass door, with the cool white marble steps leading up to it, and the big peony-bushes, and the syringas and that cold pure spring-water that runs all day and all night in the wooden trough. Sell that home! And to anybody!" She paused where she was, looking at him out of wide, shocked eyes. Neale was profoundly thankful for anything that would make her look straight at him like that.
"But, you see," he told her, "I hadn't the least idea about that darling old house, or the elms or the spring-water or anything. I never heard a word about it till this minute. I think the only thing is for you to start in and tell me everything."
As she hesitated, professing with an outward opening of her palms that she really didn't know exactly where to begin, he prompted her.
"Well, begin at the beginning. How in the world do you get there?"
"Oh, if you want to know from the beginning," she told him, "I must tell you at once that you change cars at Hoosick Junction. Always, always, no matter from which direction you approach, you must change cars at Hoosick Junction, and wait an hour or so there." Seeing on his face a rather strange expression, she feared that he had lost the point of her little pleasantry, and inquired, "But perhaps it is that you do not know Hoosick Junction."
"Oh, yes, I know Hoosick Junction all right." He said it with a long breath of wonder. "I changed cars at Hoosick Junction to get here!"
"Eh bien, and then a train finally takes you from Hoosick Junction. You sit pressing your little nose against the window, waiting to see the mountains, and when the first one heaves up softly, all blue against the horizon, you feel a happy ache in your throat, and you look harder than ever. And by and by some one calls out 'Shley!' (you know he means Ashley) and you take your little satchel and stumble down the aisle, and the conductor lifts you down the steps and there is dear old Cousin Hetty with her wrinkled face shining on you. She only gives you a dry little peck on your lips, quick and hard, and says, 'Well, Marise, you got here, I see,' but you feel all over you, warm, how glad she is to see you. And you hug her a great deal till she says, 'there! there!' but you know she likes it very much."