He and Mrs.Hobbs were conversing briskly enough and, although Mary-'Gusta could catch only a word or two at intervals, she was perfectly sure they were talking about her.

She was certain that if she were to appear at that moment in the door of the barn they would stop talking immediately and look at her.

Everybody whom she had met during the past two days looked at her in that queer way.

It made her feel as if she had something catching, like the measles, and as if, somehow or other, she was to blame.
She realized dimly that she should feel very, very badly because her stepfather was dead.

Mrs.Hobbs had told her that she should and seemed to regard her as queerer than ever because she had not cried.