It was a suggestion of scandal that had put the grey hairs upon her head.
The scandal had blown over before the time of her friendship for Sam, but
he had known of it. In those days he knew of everything that went on in
the town--his quick ears and eyes missed nothing. More than once he had
heard the men waiting to be shaved in Sawyer's barber shop speak of her.
The tale ran that she had been involved in an affair with a real estate
agent who had afterward left town. It was said that the man, a tall, fine-
looking fellow, had been in love with Mary and had wanted to desert his
wife and go away with her. One night he had driven to Mary's house in a
closed buggy and the two had driven into the country. They had sat for
hours in the covered buggy at the side of the road and talked, and people
driving past had seen them there talking together.
And then she had got out of the buggy and walked home alone through snow
drifts. The next day she was at school as usual. When told of it the
school superintendent, a puttering old fellow with vacant eyes, had shaken
his head in alarm and declared that it must be looked into. He called Mary
into his little narrow office in the school building, but lost courage
when she sat before him, and said nothing.
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