“There’s our little tavern,” cried Kilian at last, starting up the horses.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” murmured Mary Leighton, “we have had such a lovely drive.”

My vis-a-vis groaned and looked at me as this observation reached us.  I laughed a little hysterically:  I was so glad to be at the half-way house—­and Mary Leighton’s words were so absurd.  When we got out of the carriage, the dissatisfied man stretched his long English limbs out, and lighting his cigar, began silently to pace the bricks in front of the house.

Kilian took us into the little parlor (we were the first to arrive), and committed us to the care of a thin, tired-looking woman, and then went to see to the comfort of his horses.

The tired woman, who looked as if she never had sat down since she grew up, took us to some rooms, where we were to rest till tea was ready.  The rooms had been shut up all day, and the sun had been beating on them:  they smelled of paint and dust and ill-brushed carpets.  The water in the pitchers was warm and not very clear:  the towels were very small and thin, the beds were hard, and the pillows very small, like the towels:  they felt soft and warm and limp, like sick kittens.  We threw open the windows and aired the rooms, and washed our faces and hands:  and Miss Lowder lay down on the bed and put her head on a pile of four of the little pillows collected from the different rooms.  Mary Leighton spent the time in re-arranging her hair, and I walked up and down the hall, too impatient to rest myself in any way.

By-and-by the others came, and then there was a hubbub and a clatter, and poor Miss Lowder’s head was overlooked in the melee; for these were all the rooms the house afforded for the entertainment of wayfarers, and as there were nine ladies in our party, it is not difficult to imagine the confusion that ensued.

Benny and Charley also came to have their hair arranged, and it devolved on Charlotte and me to do it, as their mamma had thrown herself exhausted on one of the beds, and with the bolsters doubled up under her head, was trying to get some rest.

It was fully half-past seven before the tea-bell rang.  I seized Benny’s hand, and we were the first on the ground.  I don’t know how I thought this would be useful in hurrying matters, for Benny’s tea and mine were very soon taken, and were very insignificant fractions of the general business.

There were kerosene lamps on the table, and everything was served in the plainest manner, but the cooking was really good, and it was evident that the tired woman had been on her feet all her life to some purpose.  Almost every one was hungry, and the contrast to the cold meats, and the hard rocks, and the disjointed apparatus of the noonday meal, was very favorable.

Richard had put me between himself and Benny, and he watched my undiminished supper with disapprobation:  but I do not believe he ate much more himself.  He put everything that he thought I might like, before me, silently:  and I think the tired woman (who was waitress as well as cook), must have groaned over the frequent changing of my plate.