"And suppos'n that's a gift that nobody wants?" said Mrs.
Douglass's sharp eye and voice at once.
"In that case," said the doctor, "I really Miss Ringgan, may
I a may I relieve your hand of this fair burden?"
"It is not a very fair burden, Sir," said Fleda, laughing, and relinquishing her strawberries.
"Ah, but, fair, you know, I mean we speak in that sense Mrs. Douglass, here is by far the most elegant offering that your hands will have the honour of receiving this day."
"I hope so," said Mrs. Douglass, "or there wont be much to eat for the minister. Did you never take notice how elegant things somehow made folks grow poor?"
"I guess he'd as lieve see something a little substantial," said aunt Syra.
"Well, now," said the doctor, "here is Miss Ringgan, who is unquestionably a elegant! and I am sure nobody will say that she looks poor."
In one sense, surely not! There could not be two opinions. But with all the fairness of health, and the flush which two or three feelings had brought to her cheeks, there was a look as if the workings of the mind had refined away a little of the strength of the physical frame, and as if growing poor in Mrs. Douglass's sense that is, thin, might easily be the next step.
"What's your uncle going to give us, Fleda?" said aunt Syra.
But Fleda was saved replying; for Mrs. Douglass, who, if she was sharp, could be good-natured too, and had watched to see how Fleda took the double fire upon elegance and poverty, could bear no more trial of that sweet gentle face. Without giving her time to answer, she carried her off to see the things already stored in the closet, bidding the doctor, over her shoulder, "be off after his goods, whether he had got 'em or no."