"Oh, don't ask me, child!" was the nervous reply. "Mr. Droop's in the parlor."
Phoebe had forgotten her short interview with Droop, and she now snatched off her hat in surprise and followed her elder sister, nodding to their visitor as she entered.
"Set down, both o' ye," said Rebecca. "Now, then, Mr. Droop, perhaps you'll explain."
Rebecca was far more mystified and interested than she cared to admit. Her brusque manner was therefore much exaggerated--a dissimulation which troubled her conscience, which was decidedly of the tenderest New England brand.
Poor Copernicus experienced a sense of relief as he turned his eyes to those of the younger sister. She felt that Rebecca's manner was distinctly cold, and her own expression was the more cordial in compensation.
"Why, Miss Phoebe," he said, eagerly, "I've ben tellin' your sister about my plan to go back to the Centennial year--1876, ye know."
Phoebe's polite cordiality gave place to amazed consternation. Droop raised a deprecating hand.
"Now don't you go to think I'm tight or gone crazy. You'll understand it, fer you've ben to high school. Now see! What is it makes the days go by--ain't it the daily revolution of the sun?"
Phoebe put on what her sister always called "that schoolmarm look" and replied:
"Why, it's the turning round of the earth on its axis once in----"
"Yes--yes--It's all one--all one," Droop broke in, eagerly. "To put it another way, it comes from the sun cuttin' meridians, don't it?"
Rebecca, who found this technical and figurative expression beyond her, paused in her knitting and looked anxiously at Phoebe, to see how she would take it. After a moment of thought, the young woman admitted her visitor's premises.
"Very good! An' you know's well's I do, Miss Phoebe, that ef a man travels round the world the same way's the sun, he ketches up on time a whole day when he gets all the way round. In other words, the folks that stays at home lives jest one day more than the feller that goes round the world that way. Am I right?"
Droop glanced triumphantly at Rebecca. This tremendous admission on her learned young sister's part stripped her of all pretended coldness. Her deep interest was evident now in her whole pose and expression.