"AnnieHamiltonDonnell-RebeccaMary" - читать интересную книгу автора (Donnell Annie Hamilton)

Rebecca Mary rose slowly to her reluctant little feet, and with the
heavy sheet across her arm went to meet the sharp voice. At last
the Time had come.

"Well?" Aunt Olivia was waiting for her answer. Rebecca Mary
groaned. Aunt Olivia would not think it was "well."

"Well, Rebecca Mary Plummer, you came to fetch my answer, did you?
You got your stent 'most done?" Aunt Olivia's hands were extended
for the folded sheet.

"I've got it DONE, Aunt 'Livia," answered little Rebecca Mary,
steadily. Her slender figure, in its quaint, scant dress, looked
braced as if to meet a shock. But Rebecca Mary was terribly afraid.

"Every mite o' that seam? Then I guess you can't have done it very
well; that's what I guess! If it ain't done well, you'll have to
take it--"

"Wait--please, won't you wait, Aunt 'Livia? I've got to say
something. I mean, I've got all the over-'n'-overing I'm ever going
to do done. THAT'S what's done. The hundred-and-oneth stitch was
my stent, and it's done. I'm not ever going to take the hundred
and twoth. I've decided."

Understanding filtered drop by drop into Aunt Olivia's bewildered
brain. She gasped at the final drop.

"Not ever going to take another stitch?" she repeated, with a
calmness that was awfuler than storm.

"No'm."

"You've decided?"

"Yes'm."

"May I ask when this--this state of mind began?"

Rebecca Mary girded herself afresh. She had such need of recruiting
strength.

"It's been coming on," she said. "I've felt it. I knew all the time
it was a-coming--and then it came."

It seemed to be all there. Why must she say any more? But still
Aunt Olivia waited, and Rebecca Mary read grim displeasure in
capitals across the gray field of her face. The little figure
stiffened more and more.