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Ever since her home had burned the year before she had been under the friendly roof up at Elmhurst, helping out according to her strength, and never fully realizing how the shelter of the old house kept her from the poor-farm down on the Plains. She came into the store with an old black lace veil fluttering as usual from her hat, and a brown bombazine dress that dated from the eighties.
"Guess he's been crazy over dollars and cents all his life, and this is just an acute phase of it," replied Jerome, calmly, taking up his plough handles again. "I b'lieve the hull town's crazy. I've heard that Doctor Prescott has give his place back to John Upham, an' Peter Thomas is comin' out of the poor-farm an' goin' back to his old house.
This unexpected incident of the freight train was the reason why everybody about the South Byfleet station insisted that no such person had taken passage by the regular train that same morning, and why there were those who persuaded themselves that Miss Betsey Lane was probably lying at the bottom of the poor-farm pond.
Miss Vesta paused, and the shadow of a great awe crept into her keen blue eyes. "The poor-farm was struck by lightning that night!" she said. "The cradle where that baby was lying was shattered into kindling-wood, and Liza Green has never been the same woman from that day to this." Melody went singing down the road. She walked quickly, with a light swaying motion, graceful as a bird.
The inmates were by no means distressed or unhappy; many of them retired to this shelter only for the winter season, and would go out presently, some to begin such work as they could still do, others to live in their own small houses; old age had impoverished most of them by limiting their power of endurance; but far from lamenting the fact that they were town charges, they rather liked the change and excitement of a winter residence on the poor-farm.
She was the dear friend of the third woman, Betsey Lane; together they led thought and opinion chiefly opinion and held sway, not only over Byfleet Poor-farm, but also the selectmen and all others in authority. Betsey Lane had spent most of her life as aid-in-general to the respected household of old General Thornton.
There ain't a place as safe as the poor-farm barn. Folks don't go hangin' round a poor-farm unless they have to. It's for there the ev'nin' before the Fourth. Agree, or count me out. The first selectman of this town can't afford to take too many chances, aidin' and abettin' a hen-fight." Therefore there was nothing else for it. The principals accepted sullenly, and went their ways.
"I don't know. However, it won't be a difficult task to find a better man than you." "I'll nae let him work." McTavish's voice deepened to a growl. "You worked that racket on my father. Try it on me, and you'll answer to me personally. Lay the weight of your finger on your successor, Mac, and you'll die in the county poor-farm. No threats, old man! You know the Cardigans; they never bluff."
For the spare chamber she showed some weakness, for the little back chamber which she usually occupied during her visits to the poor-farm was next to Oly Cowden's room, and Oly had a way of rapping on her wall in the dead of the night for somebody to bring her a roasted onion to avert a peculiarly bad dream to which she was subject; and the next room on the other side was occupied by Jo Briscoe, who had a habit of playing on his violin at most unseemly hours, and, as poor Jo had come through a terrible shipwreck, in which he had lost, by freezing, both his feet and several of his fingers, which latter loss made it wonderful that he could play at all, nobody had the heart to interfere with the consolation which "Fisher's Hornpipe" and "The Girl I left behind me" afforded him at three o'clock in the morning, nobody, that is, except "Marm Bony," whose room was on the other side of the corridor, and who took Jo's performances as a serenade, and gently insinuated to him that, as Napoleon was still living, she might be compromised by such tributes to her charms.
"And, as near as I can find out, that style is mostly scrambled!" "I've got a favor to ask," stammered Wixon, hesitatingly. "It don't mean much to you, but it means a good deal to others. Bein' penned up on a poor-farm, with nothin' except three meals a day to take up your mind, is pretty tough on them as have seen better days.
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