The increasing attention he demanded, and the care of her poultry, and her accumulated sewing kept Mrs. Deans fully occupied. So Myron Holder continued her daily attendance at the Deans farm. January and February passed. March was blowing its wildest, when one day Myron Holder did not come to Mrs. Deans'.
The latter waited fuming, resolved, as she expressed it, to "give Myron Holder a fine hearing when she did come."
Mrs. Deans was always promising somebody or other a "hearing," which, by the bye, was an exceedingly misleading term, for in the conversation thus referred to the other party did the listening whilst Mrs. Deans talked.
The wild wind of the morning had intensified into a bitter sleet, which darted its blasts into the face like sharp-pointed lashes, when Mrs. Deans heard a knock at the side door. She opened it herself to find old Mrs. Holder, bent, wet, furious, standing in the slush. Mrs. Deans bade her come in, with a meaning look at the corn husk mat before the door.
Mrs. Holder paid no heed to the look, but with muddy feet stepped into the room fair upon Mrs. Deans' new rag carpet, and standing there, a quaint old figure, clad in the forgotten fashion of thirty years back, proceeded to give Mrs. Deans what that lady herself would have called "a hearing."
Mrs. Deans had a ready tongue, an inventive imagination, a fund of vituperative imagery, and a pleasant habit of drowning the voice of any one who chose to contradict her; but in one's own house, to be confronted in this way, abused for some unknown crime, covered with contumely, and showered with contemptuous epithets, and all from an old woman whose granddaughter was honored in doing one's kitchen work, was not conducive to dignity and presence of mind.
Mrs. Deans was too old a scold, however, to be routed without an effort to vindicate herself. Finding it vain to wait an opportunity for speech (Mrs. Holder never seemed to pause for breath), she simply began to talk also—Myron's non-appearance, Mrs. Holder's impertinence, and her own mystification giving ample subject-matter for her eloquence to do justice to.
But Mrs. Holder talked on, apparently unconscious of Mrs. Deans' remarks—finally she hurled one direct question at the latter: "Did you know—that's what I want to find out—did ye? And if ye did, what d'ye think of yourself? You——"
She was about to branch off into a personal description of Mrs. Deans—somewhat unflattering—when the latter seized her cue.
"Did I know what?" she demanded.