Yet there were tiny straws which showed that the wind was quartering. A few persons inclined their heads slightly in greeting, while the deference due a customer who paid cash was creeping into the manner of Scales of the Emporium. And there were others.
These small things she noted with satisfaction. It was the kind of coin she demanded in payment for isolation and hardships. She did not want their friendship; she wanted merely their recognition. To force from those who had gone out of their way to insult and belittle her the tacit admission of her success was a portion of the task she had set herself. Her purpose, and the means of attaining it were as clear in her mind as a piece of war strategy.
Kate gauged her position with intuitive exactness, and could quite impersonally see herself as Prouty saw her. She had no hallucinations on that score and knew that she was a long way yet from the fulfillment of her ambition. When she had reached a point where to decry her success was to proclaim her disparager envious or absurd, she would be satisfied; until then, she considered herself no more successful than the failures about her who yet found room to laugh at her.
Kate now shrugged a shoulder imperceptibly as she noted that another store building was empty. So the tailor had flitted? She recalled the Western adage concerning towns with no Jews in them and smiled faintly. Two doors below, still another shop was vacant. "To Let" signs were not synonymous with prosperity. Hiram Butefish supported his back against the door jamb in an attitude which did not suggest any pressing business. Mrs. Sudds, who formerly had passed Kate with a face that was ostentatiously blank, now stared at her with a certain inquisitive amiability. Major Prouty sitting in front of the post office waved a hand at her that was comparatively friendly. Oh, yes--the wind was beginning to blow from a new direction, undoubtedly.
She stopped in front of the bank, where she kept an account only sufficiently large to pay her current expenses. She had set the brake and was wrapping the lines about them when a curious sound attracted her attention. Looking up she saw approaching the first automobile in Prouty, driven by Mrs. Abram Pantin. Beside her, elated and self-conscious, was Mrs. Jasper Toomey. Kate got down quickly to hold the heads of the leaders, who were snorting at the monster. The machine was of a type which gave the driver the appearance of taking a sitz bath in public. Mrs. Pantin when driving sat up so straight that she looked like a prairie dog. Mrs. Toomey unconsciously imitated her, so they looked like two prairie dogs out for an airing--a thought which occurred to Kate as she watched the approaching novelty.