Certain it was, at all events, that she had grown, during her sojourn there, from a young and comely, though sober-faced woman, to considerably more than middle age; though time had perhaps used her less kindly than most women in her situation in life, which is saying a good deal.

No one could tell where she came from, or what her previous life had been.

She had first made her appearance as purchaser of the house in which she had ever since lived, and kept boarders.

She was uncommunicative, without seeming offensively reserved; quietly tenacious of her rights, though far from grasping or aggressive, and was endowed with decided executive ability.
She had made a most unexceptionable landlady; one or two of her boarders had been with her almost since the inception of her enterprise; while all the better class of transient visitors to the village, which had a moderate popularity as a summer resort, made their first application for rooms to her.
Some ten or twelve years after her establishment, Professor Valeyon and his family had moved into town.

They had not taken up their quarters at Abbie's, though she could easily have accommodated them, as far as room went; a circumstance which caused all the more surprise in some quarters, because there seemed to have been some previous acquaintance between herself and the professor.