Kate examined the room carefully, the bed, the closet, and tried
the chairs. Behind the girl, Mrs. Holt, with compressed lips,
forgetting Adam's presence, watched in evident disapproval.
"I want to see the stove," said Kate.
"It is out in the woodhouse. It hasn't been cleaned up for the
winter yet."
"Then it won't be far away. Let's look at it."
Almost wholly lacking experience, Kate was proceeding by instinct
in exactly the same way her father would have taken through
experience. Mrs. Holt hesitated, then turned: "Oh, very well,"
she said, leading the way down the hall, through the dining room,
which was older in furnishing and much more worn, but still clean
and wholesome, as were the small kitchen and back porch. From it
there was only a step to the woodhouse, where on a little platform
across one end sat two small stoves for burning wood, one so small
as to be tiny. Kate walked to the larger, lifted the top, looked
inside, tried the dampers and drafts and turning said: "That is
very small. It will require more wood than a larger one."
Mrs. Holt indicated dry wood corded to the roof.
"We git all our wood from the thicket across the way. That little
strip an' this lot is all we have left of father's farm. We kept
this to live on, and sold the rest for town lots, all except that
gully, which we couldn't give away. But I must say I like the
trees and birds better than mebby I'd like people who might live
there; we always git our wood from it, and the shade an' running
water make it the coolest place in town."
"Yes, I suppose they do," said Kate.
She took one long look at everything as they returned to the hall.
"The Trustee told me your terms are four dollars and fifty cents a
week, furnishing food and wood," she said, "and that you allowed
the last teacher to do her own washing on Saturday, for nothing.
Is that right?"
The thin lips drew more tightly. Mrs. Holt looked at Kate from
head to foot in close scrutiny.
"I couldn't make enough to pay the extra work at that," she said.
"I ought to have a dollar more, to really come out even. I'll
have to say five-fifty this fall."
"If that is the case, good-bye," said Kate. "Thank you very much
for showing me. Five-fifty is what I paid at Normal, it is more
than I can afford in a village like this."
She turned away, followed by Adam. They crossed the street,
watered the horse at the stream, placed his food conveniently for
him, and taking their lunch box, seated themselves on a grassy
place on the bank and began eating.