"Well?" she asked, after a time. He started and awoke to realities.
"I was just thinkin'," he explained, "that you was the only woman that has been in this house since the summer I let it to the Davidson folks. And Mrs. Davidson wan't a mite like you."
That was true enough. Mrs. Davidson had been a plump elderly matron with gray hair, a rather rasping voice and a somewhat aggressive manner. Mrs. Armstrong was young and slim, her hair and eyes were dark, her manner refined and her voice low and gentle. And, if Jed had been in the habit of noticing such things, he might have noticed that she was pleasant to look at. Perhaps he was conscious of this fact, but, if so, it was only in a vague, general way.
His gaze wandered to Barbara, who, with Petunia, was curled up in a big old-fashioned rocker.
"And a child, too," he mused. "I don't know when there's been a child in here. Not since I was one, I guess likely, and that's too long ago for anybody to remember single-handed."
But Mrs. Armstrong was interested in his previous remark.
"You have let others occupy this house then?" she asked.
"Yes, ma'am, one summer I did. Let it furnished to some folks name of Davidson, from Chicago."
"And you haven't rented it since?"
"No, ma'am, not but that once."