Excerpt from Ramshackle House On Decoration Day there was a battle-ship lying in the river. As Pen Broome ew in and out of the big house upon her interminable chores she had a distant View of the holiday crowds on the green com mon of the Island. Black and white splotches repre sented the game of ball that was going on between the island boys and the sailors and black dots stood for the automobiles of week-end trippers from the great world. Later Pen knew there had been a church supper under the big linden trees alongside the parson age, and at night a dance up the county. Ordinarily Pen was not given to resenting her lot; she was too busy. She had no personal interest in sailors nor in the island boys, and very little in the county people, her own sort. But to-day the spectacle of holiday-mak ing brought an unbearable gnawing to her breast. She was twenty-four. Pen was no tame and pathetic figure. She was the sort of youngster that is made savage by pain. Con sequently next morning there was thunder in the air at Broome's Point. Pen's storms were rare and rather terrible. They cleared the air wonderfully. Perhaps it would have been better for that slack household if they had broken oftener. Black Aunt Maria Gar ner seeing her mistress' face, rolled the whites of her eyes apprehensively, and propelled her unwieldy bulk about the kitchen with a surprising celerity. She said cooingly. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."