"She'll be all right," he observed. "She takes these spells. But trust the old lady to come up smiling."
"It's either Christian Science or osteopathy," Aggie said dolefully. "She's not herself. The fruit cake she sent me the other day tasted very queer, and Hannah thinks she put ointment in instead of butter."
"Ointments!" observed Charlie thoughtfully. "And salves! By George, I wonder—I'll tell you," he said: "I'll keep an eye open for a few days. The symptoms sound like—But never mind. I'll let you know."
We were compelled to be satisfied with this, but for several days we lingered in anxiety. During that painful interval nothing occurred to enlighten us, except one conversation with Tish.
We had taken dinner with her, and she seemed to be all right again and more than usually active. She had given up the Bran-Nut after breaking a tooth on it, and was eating rare beef, which she had heard was digested in the spleen or some such place, thus resting the stomach for a time. She left us, however, immediately after the meal, and Hannah, her maid, tiptoed into the room.
"I'm that nervous I could scream," she said. "Do you know what she's doing now?
"No, Hannah," I said with bitter sarcasm. "Long ago I learned never to surmise what Miss Tish is doing."
"She's in the bathroom, standing on one foot and waving the other in the air. She's been doing it," Hannah said, "for weeks. First one foot, then the other. And that ain't all."
"You've been spying on Miss Tish," Aggie said. "Shame on you, Hannah!"
"I have, Miss Aggie. Spy I have and spy I will, while there's breath in my body. Twenty years have I—Do you know what she does when she come home from these sneakin' trips of hers? She sits in a hot bath until the wonder is that her blood ain't turned to water. And after that she uses liniment. Her underclothes is that stained up with it that I'm ashamed to hang 'em out."