Emmy's fair skin reddened painfully. "No, she—she isn't well," she stammered.
Mrs. Conner coughed a dry, inexpressive cough.
"I do wish you would step in and see mother for a minute," Emmy begged, as much with her eyes as with her voice. "I can hitch the horse if Miss Keith minds—"
But Miss Keith did not mind; she was quite willing to hold the horse. And the horse sagging his elderly head, appeared of no mind to move, whether "held" or no.
"Well?" said Mrs. Conner, when they were out of earshot.
"Mother thinks she is threatened with pleurisy, and she is trying the starvation cure," answered Emmy. "She hasn't eaten a bite since yesterday. I'm ashamed to be so late about my washing, but I've been cooking things all day, trying to tempt her—"
"Oh dear! Oh dear! Oh dear!" moaned the figure on the piazza.
Mrs. Conner put her arms akimbo. She looked steadfastly at the swaying and moaning shape. Mrs. Conner was a woman who had been known to fry fresh griddle-cakes for tramps. She drew in her breath and exhaled it explosively, as one that has been shocked out of speech.
"I've made her postum cereal coffee and cooked her granum, and I went out and begged dewberries from the Bigelows—she used to be fond of them—and I don't know how many times I've made toast. She says I just torment her."
"Won't she drink a little beef tea?"