“Don't you think so?” asked Miss Thorne, after a long pause.
“Yes'm.”
“It's all very reasonable, isn't it?”
“Yes'm.”
In spite of the seeming assent, she knew that Hepsey was not convinced; and afterward, when she came into the room with the attic lamp and a box of matches, the mystery returned to trouble Ruth again.
“If I don't take up tatting,” she thought, as she went upstairs, “or find something else to do, I'll be a meddling old maid inside of six months.”
IV. A Guest
As the days went by, Ruth had the inevitable reaction. At first the country brought balm to her tired nerves, and she rested luxuriously, but she had not been at Miss Hathaway's a fortnight before she bitterly regretted the step she had taken.
Still there was no going back, for she had given her word, and must stay there until October. The months before her stretched out into a dreary waste. She thought of Miss Ainslie gratefully, as a redeeming feature, but she knew that it was impossible to spend all of her time in the house—it the foot of the hill.