The spirit of gloom still hovered over Betty Gallup in the rear premises where she was sweeping and dusting and scrubbing.  Her idea of cleanliness indoors was about the same as that of a smart skipper of an old-time clipper ship.

“If that woman ain’t holystonin’ the deck ev’ry day she thinks we’re wadin’ in dirt, boot-laig high,” growled Cap’n Amazon.

“Cleanliness is next to godliness!” quoted Louise, who was in the store at the moment.

“Land sakes!” ejaculated the captain.  “It’s next door to a lot of other things, seems like, too.  I shouldn’t say that Bet Gallup was spillin’ over with piety.”

Louise, laughing softly, went to the door.  There was a cloud of dust up the road and ahead of it came a small automobile.  Cap’n Amazon was singing, in a rather cracked voice: 

“‘The Boundin’ Biller, Captain Hanks,
She was hove flat down on the Western Banks;------”

With a saucy blast of its horn the automobile flashed past the store.  There were two young women in it, one driving.  Louise felt sure they were Miss Louder and Miss Noyes, mentioned by Gusty Durgin the day before, and their frocks and hats were all that their names suggested.

“Them contraptions,” Cap’n Amazon broke off in his ditty to say, “go past so swift that you can’t tell rightly whether they got anybody to the helm or not.  Land sakes, here comes another!  They’re getting as common as sandfleas on Horseneck Bar, and Washy Gallup says that’s a-plenty.”

He did not need to come to the door to make this discovery of the approach of the second machine.  There sounded another blast from an auto horn and a considerable racket of clashing gears.

“Land sakes!” Cap’n Amazon added.  “Is it going to heave to here?”

Louise had already entered the living-room, bound for her chamber to see if, by chance, Betty had finished dusting there.  She did not hear the second automobile stop nor the cheerful voice of its gawky driver as he said to his fare: 

“This is the place, ma’am.  This is Cap’n Abe’s.”

His was the only car in public service at the Paulmouth railroad station and Willy Peebles seldom had a fare to Cardhaven.  Noah Coffin’s ark was good enough for most Cardhaven folk if they did not own equipages of their own.

When Willy reached around and snapped open the door of the covered car a lady stepped out and, like a Newfoundland after a plunge into the sea, shook herself.  The car was a cramped vehicle and the ride had been dusty.  Her clothing was plentifully powdered; but her face was not.  That was heated, perspiring, and expressed a mixture of indignation and disapproval.

“Are you sure this is the place, young man?” she demanded.

“This is Cap’n Abe Silt’s,” repeated Willy.

“Why--it doesn’t look------”

“Want your suitcase, ma’am?” asked Willy.

“Wait.  I am not sure.  I—­I must see if I——.  I may not stay.  Wait,” she repeated, still staring about the neighborhood.