"
Rose drew in a long sigh and for a moment drooped a little.
"Yes, I see," she said with a rueful little smile. They were afraid of
him, and he was afraid of them.
"I'm sorry about it," said the judge. "If there's anything else I can
do ..." He put his hand tentatively in his pocket.
"No," Rose said, "that isn't what I want. Mr. Culver offered me two
dollars to go away. I suppose you might offer me ten. But I'm not going.
There is somebody in this town who isn't afraid of anybody, if I can
only find out who that somebody is."
For a moment the judge looked annoyed; tried to collect his scattered
dignity. But presently a twinkle lighted up in his eye. Then he smiled.
"You might try Miss Gibbons," he said.
"Who is she?" Rose asked.
By now the judge was smiling broadly. Apparently there was something
exquisitely humorous in the notion of an encounter between Rose and this
lady he'd mentioned.
"She's lived," he said, "and practised gossip and millinery, for the
last thirty years, up over the drug-store on the next corner.
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