Also , they were astute . Without mentioning money , they contrived to instil into Mr. Meredith 's mind a conviction that he should not offend Mrs. Davis . Otherwise , he would likely have forgotten all about her as soon as Aunt Martha had gone out . As it was , he turned down his Ewald with a feeling of annoyance and went across the hall to the parlour . Mrs. Davis was sitting on the sofa , looking about her with an air of scornful disapproval . What a scandalous room ! There were no curtains on the window . Mrs. Davis did not know that Faith and Una had taken them down the day before to use as court trains in one of their plays and had forgotten to put them up again , but she could not have accused those windows more fiercely if she had known . The blinds were cracked and torn . The pictures on the walls were crooked ; the rugs were awry ; the vases were full of faded flowers ; the dust lay in heaps -- literally in heaps . `` What are we coming to ? '' Mrs. Davis asked herself , and then primmed up her unbeautiful mouth . Jerry and Carl had been whooping and sliding down the banisters as she came through the hall . They did not see her and continued whooping and sliding , and Mrs. Davis was convinced they did it on purpose . Faith 's pet rooster ambled through the hall , stood in the parlour doorway and looked at her . Not liking her looks , he did not venture in . Mrs. Davis gave a scornful sniff . A pretty manse , indeed , where roosters paraded the halls and stared people out of countenance . `` Shoo , there , '' commanded Mrs. Davis , poking her flounced , changeable-silk parasol at him . Adam shooed .
He was a wise rooster and Mrs. Davis had wrung the necks of so many roosters with her own fair hands XXXXX the course of her fifty years that an air of the executioner seemed to hang around her .
As Without about across at in of on through to