“Well, I shouldn’t,” said young John Bean, who came up at that moment, and who had passed the chaise just as the young lady alighted from it. “I shouldn’t be ashamed to kiss sich a pretty gal as that any how; I’d kiss her wherever I could ketch her, if it was in the meetin-house.”
“Why, is she handsome, Jack?” said Patty.
“Yes, she’s got the prettiest little puckery kind of a mouth I’ve seen this six months. Her cheeks are red, and her eyes shine like new buttons.”
“Well,” replied Patty, “if she’ll only take the shine off of Susan Jones when she goes to meetin, Sunday, I sha’n’t care.”
While these observations were going on at old Mr. Bean’s, Charles Robinson and a group of young fellows with him were standing in front of Robinson’s store, a little farther down the road, and watching the scene that was passing at Squire Johnson’s. They witnessed the whole with becoming decorum, now and then making a remark about the fine horse and the handsome chaise, till they saw the tall squire bend his head down and give the young lady a kiss, when they all burst out into a loud laugh. In a moment, being conscious that their laugh must be heard and noticed at the squire’s, they, in order to do away the impression it must necessarily make, at once turned their heads the other way, and Charles Robinson, who was quick at an expedient, knocked off the hat of the lad who was standing next to him, and then they all laughed louder than before.
“Here comes Jack Bean,” said Charles, “now we shall hear something about her, for Jack was coming by the squire’s when she got out of the chaise. How does she look, Jack?”
“Handsome as a picter,” said Jack. “I haint seen a prettier gal since last Thanksgiving Day, when Jane Ford was here to visit Susan Jones.”
“Black eyes or blue?” said Charles.
“Blue,” said Jack, “but all-fired bright.”
“Tall or short?” said Stephen Jones, who was rather short himself, and therefore felt a particular interest on that point.