reakfast was over. Georgia, blushing and smiling beneath Miss Jerusha's curious scrutiny, had gone back to her room, and Miss Jerusha, sitting in her low rocking-chair, was left alone with the bright morning sunshine that lay in broad patches on the floor to the special delectation of Mrs. and Miss Betsey Periwinkle.
Miss Jerusha was thinking of a good many things in general, but Georgia's unaccountable freaks in particular, when a well-known step sounded on the threshold, and the tall, stately form of Richmond Wildair stood before her.
Miss Jerusha was always pleased to have the rich young squire visit her, because it added to her importance in the eyes of the villagers; so she got up with a brisk, delighted "how d'ye do," and placed a chair for her visitor.
"All alone, Miss Jerusha?" said Mr. Wildair, taking up Betsey Periwinkle the second, who came purring politely around him, and stroking her mottled coat.
"Wall, not exactly," said Miss Jerusha. "Georgia's up stairs, for a wonder. I'll call her down, if you like."
"No—never mind," said Mr. Wildair. "Miss Georgia doesn't always seem so glad to see me that she should be disturbed now on my account."
"Wall, Mr. Wildair, Georgey's queer; there's never no tellin' what she'll do; if you 'spect her to do one thing you may be pretty certain she'll do 'xactly t'other. Now, yesterday afternoon she went out as glum as a porkypine"—Miss Jerusha's ideas of porcupines were rather vague—"and, bless my stars! if she didn't come in a smilin' like a basket of chips. My 'pinion is," said Miss Jerusha, firmly, "that something's come to her; you needn't believe it if you don't like too, but I do."
A smile full of curious meaning broke over Mr. Wildair's face.
"On the contrary, my dear madam, I do believe it most firmly. Not only do I think something came to her yesterday, but I know it from positive observation."