She took up her needles and her work, and fell to knitting.
"I suppose they must be very rich—the Parkers, I mean." This was offered as a wedge to break the silence, for the needles were going very rapidly now, and the stitches seemed to call for the closest watching.
"Yes," said Mary.
I lighted my pipe again.
"What a grand man Tim will be when he comes back home." I suggested this after a long silence. "He'll look fine in his city clothes, for somehow those city men do dress differently from us country chaps. Now just picture Tim in a—in a——"
Mary was humming softly to herself.
XI
The county paper always comes on Thursday. This was Thursday. Elmer Spiker sat behind the stove, in a secluded corner, the light of the lamp on the counter falling over his left shoulder on the leading column of locals. Elmer was reading. There was a store rule forbidding him to read aloud, which caused him much hardship, for as he worked his way slowly down the column, his right eye and left ear kept twitching and twitching as though trying to keep time with his lips.
Josiah Nummler's long pole rested on the counter at his side, and his great red hands were spread out to drink in the heat from the glowing bowl of the stove.