they had been so blissful? Good-by, little house, dear little house. I will never forget you.
How strange to know what was under that roof as well as if she had lifted it off by its pale-blue feather of smoke. Lizzie chopping up cold mutton to cream for supper (at least, Kate hoped she was), the teapot round as the silver moon, the place in the tub where the fresh paint had come up with Joe after a hot bath, their great dark bed with all its carved rosettes. Strange to see inside her home from this high hill; to see inside other houses, that looked so placid in the September sunshine; to know that in one Mr. Thornton lay dead, in one Miss Smith had a toothache that made her face look like a squirrel with its cheeks full of nuts. In one the three Misses Mortimer lived a life of terror with their mad old mother; in another Mrs. Driggs had just discharged her cook for drinking the cooking sherry. Better to look at the town from far away, from above, only seeing peace in the sunlight.
She must try to see life that way, too, to see the peace and love between Joe and her instead of letting her worries blot out everything. The worry of Mr. Turben, smiling and anxious about the bills for the last two months. She had been rather haughty with Mr. Turben, because she was sure Joe had said he had paid the July bill, and then it turned out that she must! have misunderstood him. The worry of having Lizzie cross as two sticks because of so many dinner parties. Joe would ask people, and say, "Give them whatever
