Out of the obscurity in the back of the store an old man's narrow bristling face peered, watchful as a cat, his body hunched up in a round-backed arm-chair.
“Mr. Nims will go in a minute,” Rose whispered, and presently the old farmer clamped past them out the door, counting his change from one hand to the other, his lips moving.
William Berry replaced the seed packages which the customer had rejected on the shelves as the girls approached him.
“Rebecca's got some eggs to sell,” Rose announced.
William Berry's thin, wide-shouldered figure towered up behind the counter; he smiled, and the smile was only a deepening of the pleasant intensity of his beardless face, with its high pale forehead and smooth crest of fair hair. The lines in his face scarcely changed.
“How d'ye do?” said he.
“How d'ye do?” returned Rebecca, with fluttered dignity. Her face bloomed deeply pink in the green tunnel of her sun-bonnet, her black eyes were as soft and wary as a baby's, her full red lips had a grave, innocent expression.
“How many dozen eggs have you got, Rebecca?” Rose inquired, peering into the basket.
“Two; mother couldn't spare any more to-day,” Rebecca replied, in a trembling voice.