“I say, have ye got hungry agin for termarters?” he repeated.
Then he rattled the screen; but it was hooked on the inside.
He turned and surveyed the three windows that were visible in the bit of a house.
“They wouldn’t both be gone, ‘n’ left them apples out,” he said to himself. “I’m ‘bout sure Ann’s to home; ‘n’ she’s the one I want to see.”
A woman in the bed-room which opened from the kitchen was hurriedly smoothing her hair and peering into the glass. She was speaking aloud with the air of one who constantly talks to herself.
“Jest as sure’s I don’t comb my hair the first thing, somebody comes.”
She gave a last pat and went to the door. There was a faint smirk on her lips and a flush on her face.
Her tall figure was swayed by a slight, eager tremor as she saw who was standing there. She exclaimed:--
“Goodness me! ‘T ain’t you, Mr. Baker, is it? Won’t ye walk right in? But I don’t want no termarters; they always go aginst me. Aunt Mandany ain’t to home.”
“Oh, ain’t she?” was the brisk response. “Then I guess I will come in.”
The speaker pushed open the now unfastened door and entered. He set his basket of tomatoes with a thump on the rug, and wiped his broad, red face.
“Fact is,” he said with a grin, “I knew she was gone. I seen her goin’ crosst the pastur’. That’s why I come now. I ain’t got no longin’ to see Aunt Mandany--no, sir-ee, not a grain of longin’ to see her. But I thought ‘t would be agreeable to me to clap my eyes on to you.”
The woman simpered, made an inarticulate sound, and hurriedly resumed her seat and her apple-cutting.
“Won’t you se’ down, Mr. Baker?” she asked.
Her fingers trembled as she took the darning-needle and jabbed it through an apple quarter. The needle went into her flesh also. She gave a little cry and thrust her finger into her mouth. Her large, pale eyes turned wistfully towards her companion. The faded, already elderly mouth quivered.
“I’m jest as scar’t ‘s I c’n be if I see blood,” she whispered.
Mr. Baker’s heavy under lip twitched; his face softened. But he spoke roughly.
“You needn’t mind that bit er blood,” he said, “that won’t hurt nothin’. I don’t care if I do se’ down. I ain’t drove any this mornin’. I c’n jest as well as not take hold ‘n’ help ye. I s’pose Mandany left a thunderin’ lot for ye to do while she’s gone?”