“There, Granny, guess it ain’t hard to see who is the favorite in this town,” she whispered vehemently. “Law’s sakes, if here ain’t another; that makes twenty-one! Wonder what it is? It feels for all the world like a milk-strainer, but I never heard of such a thing hung on a tree.”
Granny’s face flushed, puckered, and flamed into crimson.
“Don’t talk so loud, Marthy. Ain’t you got no manners! Oh, whatever, ever shall I do?”
“Do?” wheezed Mrs. Keel, leaning over the back of her pew. “Do? Why, take every one of ’em and enjoy ’em. Ain’t one but what’s filled with love, even if it is a milk-strainer, though I can’t see why anybody come to think of that.”
“Goodness knows, we needed it bad enough,” returned Martha, shrilly, over Mrs. Keel’s shoulder. “I’ve been jaw-smithin’ about it fer the last month, but she wus always forgittin’ it.”
“Looks to me as if that was a coal-hod,” remarked Billy Keel, prodding a bulky bundle on Granny’s lap with a fat forefinger.
“You hush up, Billy Keel,” exclaimed Granny, resentfully. “I ain’t makin’ any remark about your gif’s, be I?”
Billy, as much astonished as if one of his pet doves had pecked him, hung his head in shame.
“Mrs. Polly Simmers,” announced the Brother, pompously, as he slowly clambered to the floor; “that is the last gif’.”
“Ahem!” began Brother Sutton, his mild old eyes beaming with joy as he looked over his congregation. He drew his tall length to its uttermost, set the tips of his fingers together, and teetered slowly back and forth from toe to heel. “Ahem! It has been gratifying indeed to see so much generosity. But most of all it has pleased us to see that the receiver of the lion’s share has been our aged sister, Mrs. Polly Simmers. It is delightful that her unselfish life, her high sense of honor, her sweet sympathy, has been appreciated.”