About her waist there was a line of more or less white material. This marked the hiatus between her skirt and its bodice—a peculiarity of Sally’s ensemble. When she stooped over, this white strip widened, giving one a horrible premonition that she was about to break asunder. When she stood erect, it frilled out around her like a misplaced ruff. Sally had bandied words amiably with every one who passed to the funeral, and when Sidney Martin almost stood still in his astonishment at her appearance, she was ready to greet him affably and volubly.
“Hello!” she said. “You’re the Boston chap that prayed the rain down, aren’t you?”
Sidney coloured quickly. The sting of his thoughts pressed home by the gamine’s impertinent speech.
“Oh, don’t be bashful,” said Sally; “Mrs. Didymus says it was a powerful effort!” She uttered the last two words with impish precision.
“And who are you?” asked Sidney, feeling he must carry the war into the other camp.
“Me—well, you ain’t been long in Dole, or you’d know me. I’m the maid of all works at the parson’s.” Then she harked back to the old theme. “So you really prayed in the church. My! You don’t look as if you used bad words. Say, I thought there was some acters comin’ t’ the funeral? That’s what I fixed myself up for. Say, how d’ye like my hair?” Sidney, despite his sad thoughts, could not forbear laughing as he replied:
“It’s great, it’s really great!”
“So I thought myself,” said Sally complacently; then she added confidentially, “It’s great for style, but ’taint much for comfort. I wonder when the acters ’ll come. How d’ye s’pose they’ll be dressed? When I was a kid in Blueberry Alley, I once went t’ see Uncle Tom’s Cabin. It was fine when Elizer went across the ice. My! it did jiggle. If you had been there, I s’pose you could have prayed it solid?”
An intolerable pang, absurdly disproportionate to its genesis, pierced Sidney’s soul. His supra-sensitive nature was keyed to its highest pitch. The lightest touch upon the tense strings of his emotions nigh rent his being.
He turned swiftly away from the grotesque little figure, from the village street, from the house about which the vehicles were gathered thickly. An open road lay ready to his feet, and he took it, unconscious of its direction.