Page:Watts Mumford--Whitewash.djvu/32

 their sickles blessed. Oh, it's too bad the light is going, I can't get a picture. It's fine, it's wonderful!"

Miss Bently's flat brown figure frantically beckoned them to hasten, and the three ran forward to the stone wall on which she stood, commanding a view of the church doors over the swaying heads of the crowd. A band of thirty or more women were forming in line, their black skirts kilted high, showing heavy ribbed stockings and wooden shoes. Their hard, weather-worn faces framed in the black triangular shawls that hung from under round black caps, similar to those worn by the priests of the Greek Church. In their hands they held new sickles, some naked and gleaming, some wrapped in wisps of wheat straw. Some argument of precedence was evidently in progress, which, being at last compromised, the strange procession disappeared under the sculptured arches of the portico.

"Where is the miraculous fountain, Shorty?" Sonia inquired, as the thinning crowd permitted them to descend from their perch. 28