The answer was enthusiastic. "Oh, yes!" she exclaimed, "we like it ever and ever so much. Mamma says it's—" Barbara hesitated, and then, after what was evidently a severe mental struggle, finished with, "she said once it was like paradise after category."
"After—which?"
The young lady frowned. "It doesn't seem to me," she observed, slowly, "as if 'category' was what she said. Does 'category' sound right to you, Mr. Winslow?"
Jed looked doubtful. "I shouldn't want to say that it did, right offhand like this," he drawled.
"No-o. I don't believe it was 'category.' But I'm almost sure it was something about a cat, something a cat eats—or does—or something. Mew—mouse—milk—" she was wrinkling her forehead and repeating the words to herself when Mr. Winslow had an inspiration.
"'Twan't purgatory, was it?" he suggested.
Miss Barbara's head bobbed enthusiastically. "Purr-gatory, that was it," she declared. "And it was something a cat does—purr, you know; I knew it was. Mamma said living here was paradise after purr-gatory."
Jed rubbed his chin.
"I cal'late your ma didn't care much for the board at Luretta Smalley's," he observed. He couldn't help thinking the remark an odd one to make to a child.
"Oh, I don't think she meant Mrs. Smalley's," explained Barbara. "She liked Mrs. Smalley's pretty well, well as any one can like boarding, you know," this last plainly another quotation. "I think she meant she liked living here so much better than she did living in Middleford, where we used to be."