Herbert meditated.  “Well, I got nothin’ else to do, as I know of,” he said.  “Let’s go around to the back door so’s to see if Kitty Silver’s got anything.”

Then, not amiably, but at least inconsequently, they passed inside the gate together.  Their brows were fairly unclouded; no special marks of conflict remained; for they had met and conversed in a manner customary rather than unusual.

They followed a branch of the brick walk and passed round the south side of the house, where a small orchard of apple-trees showed generous promise.  Hundreds of gay little round apples among the leaves glanced the high lights to and fro on their polished green cheeks as a breeze hopped through the yard, while the shade beneath trembled with coquettishly moving disks of sunshine like golden plates.  A pattern of orange light and blue shadow was laid like a fanciful plaid over the lattice and the wide, slightly sagging steps of the elderly “back porch”; and here, taking her ease upon these steps, sat a middle-aged coloured woman of continental proportions.  Beyond all contest, she was the largest coloured woman in that town, though her height was not unusual, and she had a rather small face.  That is to say, as Florence had once explained to her, her face was small but the other parts of her head were terribly wide.  Beside her was a circular brown basket, of a type suggesting arts-and-crafts; it was made with a cover, and there was a bow of brown silk upon the handle.

“What you been up to to-day, Kitty Silver?” Herbert asked genially.  “Any thing special?” For this was the sequel to his “so’s we can see if Kitty Silver’s got anything.”  But Mrs. Silver discouraged him.

“No, I ain’t,” she replied.  “I ain’t, an’ I ain’t goin’ to.”

“I thought you pretty near always made cookies on Tuesday,” he said.

“Well, I ain’t this Tuesday,” said Kitty Silver.  “I ain’t, and I ain’t goin’ to.  You might dess well g’on home ri’ now.  I ain’t, an’ I ain’t goin’ to.”

Docility was no element of Mrs. Silver’s present mood, and Herbert’s hopeful eyes became blank, as his gaze wandered from her head to the brown basket beside her.  The basket did not interest him; the ribbon gave it a quality almost at once excluding it from his consciousness.  On the contrary, the ribbon had drawn Florence’s attention, and she stared at the basket eagerly.

“What you got there, Kitty Silver?” she asked.

“What I got where?”

“In that basket.”

“Nemmine what I got ’n ’at basket,” said Mrs. Silver crossly, but added inconsistently:  “I dess wish somebody ast me what I got ’n ’at basket! I ain’t no cat-washwoman fer nobody!”

“Cats!” Florence cried.  “Are there cats in that basket, Kitty Silver?  Let’s look at ’em!”

The lid of the basket, lifted by the eager, slim hand of Miss Atwater, rose to disclose two cats of an age slightly beyond kittenhood.  They were of a breed unfamiliar to Florence, and she did not obey the impulse that usually makes a girl seize upon any young cat at sight and caress it.  Instead, she looked at them with some perplexity, and after a moment inquired:  “Are they really cats, Kitty Silver, do you b’lieve?”