The Ponsonby house was next to us , on the right , and between us were only a fence , a hedge of box , and a sprawly acacia tree that shaded Miss Ponsonby 's window , where she always sat sewing -- patchwork , as I 'm alive -- when she was n't working around the house . Patchwork seemed to be Miss Ponsonby 's sole and only dissipation of any kind . We guessed her age to be forty-five at least , but we found out afterward that we were mistaken . She was only thirty-five . She was tall and thin and pale , one of those drab-tinted persons who look as if they had never felt a rosy emotion in their lives . She had any amount of silky , fawn-coloured hair , always combed straight back from her face , and pinned in a big , tight bun just above her neck -- the last style in the world for any woman with Miss Ponsonby 's nose to adopt . But then I doubt if Miss Ponsonby had any idea what her nose was really like . I do n't believe she ever looked at herself critically in a mirror in her life . Her features were rather nice , and her expression tamely sweet ; her eyes were big , timid , china-blue orbs that looked as if she had been badly scared when she was little and had never got over it ; she never wore anything but black , and , to crown all , her first name was Alicia . Miss Ponsonby sat and sewed at her window for hours at a time , but she never looked our way , partly , I suppose , from habit induced by modesty , since the former occupants of our room had been two gay young bachelors , whose names Jerry and I found out all over our window-panes with a diamond . Jerry and I sat a great deal at ours , laughing and talking , but Miss Ponsonby never lifted her head or eyes . Jerry could n't stand it long ; she declared it got on her nerves ; besides , she felt sorry to see a fellow creature wasting so many precious moments of a fleeting lifetime at patchwork . So one afternoon she hailed Miss Ponsonby with a cheerful `` hello , '' and Miss Ponsonby actually looked over and said `` good afternoon , '' as prim as an eighteen-hundred-and-forty fashion plate . Then Jerry , whose name is Geraldine only in the family Bible , talked to her about the weather . Jerry can talk interestingly about anything . In five minutes she had performed a miracle -- she had made Miss Ponsonby laugh . In five minutes more she was leaning half out of the window showing Miss Ponsonby a new , white , fluffy , frivolous , chiffony waist of hers , and Miss Ponsonby was leaning halfway out of hers looking at it eagerly . At the end of a quarter of an hour they were exchanging confidences about their favourite books . Jerry was a confirmed Kiplingomaniac , but Miss Ponsonby adored Laura Jean Libbey . She said sorrowfully she supposed she ought not to read novels at all since her father disapproved .
We found out later on that Mr. Ponsonby 's way of expressing disapproval was to burn any he got hold of , and storm XXXXX his daughter about them like the confirmed old crank he was .
In around as at between if like of over that