The Mary E. Wilkins Freeman Megapack. Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

Tom Corbett, Space Cadet Megapack

      The Tom Swift Megapack

      AUTHOR MEGAPACKS

      The Achmed Abdullah Megapack

      The Second Achmed Abdullah Megapack

      The Edward Bellamy Megapack

      The B.M. Bower Megapack

      The E.F. Benson Megapack

      The Second E.F. Benson Megapack

      The Algernon Blackwood Megapack

      The Second Algernon Blackwood Megapack

      The Max Brand Megapack

      The First Reginald Bretnor Megapack

      The Wilkie Collins Megapack

      The Ray Cummings Megapack

      The Guy de Maupassant Megapack

      The Philip K. Dick Megapack

      The Erckmann-Chatrian Megapack

      The Jacques Futrelle Megapack

      The Randall Garrett Megapack

      The Second Randall Garrett Megapack

      The Anna Katharine Green Megapack

      The Zane Grey Megapack

      The Edmond Hamilton Megapack

      The Dashiell Hammett Megapack

      The M.R. James Megapack

      The Selma Lagerlof Megapack

      The Murray Leinster Megapack

      The Second Murray Leinster Megapack

      The George Barr McCutcheon Megapack

      The Talbot Mundy Megapack

      The Andre Norton Megapack

      The H. Beam Piper Megapack

      The Mack Reynolds Megapack

      The Rafael Sabatini Megapack

      The Saki Megapack

      The Robert Sheckley Megapack

      OTHER COLLECTIONS YOU MAY ENJOY

      The Great Book of Wonder, by Lord Dunsany (it should have been called “The Lord Dunsany Megapack”)

      The Wildside Book of Fantasy

      The Wildside Book of Science Fiction

      Yondering: The First Borgo Press Book of Science Fiction Stories

      To the Stars—And Beyond! The Second Borgo Press Book of Science Fiction Stories

      Once Upon a Future: The Third Borgo Press Book of Science Fiction Stories

      Whodunit?—The First Borgo Press Book of Crime and Mystery Stories

      More Whodunits—The Second Borgo Press Book of Crime and Mystery Stories

      X is for Xmas: Christmas Mysteries

      THE WIND IN THE ROSE-BUSH

      Ford Village has no railroad station, being on the other side of the river from Porter’s Falls, and accessible only by the ford which gives it its name, and a ferry line.

      The ferry-boat was waiting when Rebecca Flint got off the train with her bag and lunch basket. When she and her small trunk were safely embarked she sat stiff and straight and calm in the ferry-boat as it shot swiftly and smoothly across stream. There was a horse attached to a light country wagon on board, and he pawed the deck uneasily. His owner stood near, with a wary eye upon him, although he was chewing, with as dully reflective an expression as a cow. Beside Rebecca sat a woman of about her own age, who kept looking at her with furtive curiosity; her husband, short and stout and saturnine, stood near her. Rebecca paid no attention to either of them. She was tall and spare and pale, the type of a spinster, yet with rudimentary lines and expressions of matronhood. She all unconsciously held her shawl, rolled up in a canvas bag, on her left hip, as if it had been a child. She wore a settled frown of dissent at life, but it was the frown of a mother who regarded life as a froward child, rather than as an overwhelming fate.

      The other woman continued staring at her; she was mildly stupid, except for an over-developed curiosity which made her at times sharp beyond belief. Her eyes glittered, red spots came on her flaccid cheeks; she kept opening her mouth to speak, making little abortive motions. Finally she could endure it no longer; she nudged Rebecca boldly.

      “A pleasant day,” said she.

      Rebecca looked at her and nodded coldly.

      “Yes, very,” she assented.

      “Have you come far?”

      “I have come from Michigan.”

      “Oh!” said the woman, with awe. “It’s a long way,” she remarked presently.

      “Yes, it is,” replied Rebecca, conclusively.

      Still the other woman was not daunted; there was something which she determined to know, possibly roused thereto by a vague sense of incongruity in the other’s appearance. “It’s a long ways to come and leave a family,” she remarked with painful slyness.

      “I ain’t got any family to leave,” returned Rebecca shortly.

      “Then you ain’t—”

      “No, I ain’t.”

      “Oh!” said the woman.

      Rebecca looked straight ahead at the race of the river.

      It was a long ferry. Finally Rebecca herself waxed unexpectedly loquacious. She turned to the other woman and inquired if she knew John Dent’s widow who lived in Ford Village. “Her husband died about three years ago,” said she, by way of detail.

      The woman started violently. She turned pale, then she flushed; she cast a strange glance at her husband, who was regarding both women with a sort of stolid keenness.

      “Yes, I guess I do,” faltered the woman finally.

      “Well, his first wife was my sister,” said Rebecca with the air of one imparting important intelligence.

      “Was she?” responded the other woman feebly. She glanced at her husband with an expression of doubt and terror, and he shook his head forbiddingly.

      “I’m going to see her, and take my niece Agnes home with me,” said Rebecca.

      Then the woman gave such a violent start that she noticed it.

      “What is the matter?” she asked.

      “Nothin’, I guess,” replied the woman, with eyes on her husband, who was slowly shaking his head, like a Chinese toy.

      “Is my niece sick?” asked Rebecca with quick suspicion.

      “No, she ain’t sick,” replied the woman with alacrity, then she caught her breath with a gasp.

      “When did you see her?”

      “Let me see; I ain’t seen her for some little time,” replied the woman. Then she caught her breath again.

      “She ought to have grown up real pretty, if she takes after my sister. She was a real pretty woman,” Rebecca said wistfully.

      “Yes, I guess she did grow up pretty,” replied the woman in a trembling voice.

      “What kind of a woman is the second wife?”

      The woman glanced at her husband’s warning face. She continued to gaze at him while she replied in a choking voice to Rebecca:

      “I—guess she’s a nice woman,” she replied. “I—don’t know, I—guess so. I—don’t see much of her.”

      “I felt kind of hurt that John married again so quick,” said Rebecca; “but I suppose he wanted