The Sojourner by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

The Seth Thomas clock whirred and struck three of the afternoon. The notes hovered like birds in the comfortable warmth of the living-room. The thin sunlight streamed through the bay window and turned the pale green of Nellie's house fern to silver. The fronds of the fern on its high stand touched the floor. Ase thought it was almost like having a young willow tree inside the house. A cricket, excited perhaps by the striking of the clock, began chirping from somewhere under the fern. It had escaped Nellie for weeks, but sooner or later she would take it unaware and flip it out into the snow. Ase took her word for it that crickets were as bad as moths for eating woolen clothing, but a hole in a jacket elbow seemed to him a small price for the cheerful piping in the long winter stillness.

The dog at his feet, sleeping in a patch of sunlight on the carpet, roused and lifted his head. Nellie in the kitchen heard the sound from the road and came hurrying. She pushed aside the lace curtains at the front window and peered out. A strange Ford passed, its wheel chains clanking on the frozen snow.