A handsome woman still, though in her late fifties, erect and of
commanding presence, her figure well-proportioned if somewhat massive.
Her dark hair showed no grey. Her rather brown skin was clear, smooth and
soft in texture. Her eyes clear, too, watchful and reticent; on
occasion--such as the driving of a business bargain say, or of a drunken
client--hard as flint. Her mouth, a wholesome red, inclined to fullness;
but had been governed to straightness of line--will dominant, not only in
her every movement, but in repose as she now sat, the chair rockers at a
backward tilt, her capable and well-shaped hands folded on her black
apron in the hollow of her lap.
Putting aside all work for once, and permitting herself a space of
undisturbed leisure, she proceeded to cast up her account with love and
life in as clear-headed, accurate a fashion as she would have cast up the
columns of cash-book or ledger--and found the balance on the credit side.
So finding it, she turned her head and looked across the room at the wide
half-tester wooden bed, set against the inner wall--the white crochet
counterpane of which, an affair of intricate fancy patterns and
innumerable stitches, loomed up somewhat ghostly and pallid through the
gloom.
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