Now for the life of him Ambrose could not refrain from frowning, because, while his lips said, "Thank you," to himself he protested: "I ain't able to bear it; this man actin' toward me as though he was forgivin' me some mortal sin every time we meet."
Neither was the widow's greeting of him cheering, since forty years had not completely wiped away a certain never-explained retreat.
The promised plenitude of Peachy Williams' girlhood had been nobly fulfilled in the Widow Tarwater, for now she suggested an abundant harvest. A handsome black silk gown folded over her more than ample bosom, a double chin rippled from under the soft fulness of her broad face, her skin was white and crimson as a child's, her auburn hair without a thread of gray in it, and her huge brown eyes never having looked deep down into the waters of life showed none of its troubled reflections.
Uncle Ambrose nodded approvingly at her appearance the while she looked at him coldly, saying: "I ain't seen you to talk to in a long time, Ambrose Thompson."
His reply flatteringly included the member of the Kentucky legislature on the widow's right. "'Course you ain't, Peachy," he answered gallantly, "for when big stars is shinin' so close to a planet, t'ain't to be expected that the planet kin notice the little ones twitterin' about in her neighbourhood."
And yet when supper was served the widow found herself placed at a table for four whose other occupants were three men instead of the two whom she had expected.
CHAPTER XV
ORIGINAL SIN