Stella shook her head, but her eyes brimmed over. That evidently annoyed her, and she released the little shawl to lift a hand and brush the tears away.
"Aunt Hill has come," she said.
He had an impulse to tell her, as a piece of news that would once have concerned them both, that his own aunt was making her plans to go West again, and that she had furnished the money for him to buy back the precious strip of land. The city man, seeing how much he prized it, had sold it to him. But while he reflected that now Stella cared nothing about his intimate concerns, she was rushing on.
"And mother's sick," she ended.
"Sho!" said Jerry, in a sympathizing blur. "Real sick?"
"No, nothin' but her rheumatism. But it's in her back this time. She can't move hand nor foot."
"Why, yes," said Jerry, leaning his axe against the trunk of the wounded tree. "Course! you want I should go over 'n' help lift her."
Stella shook her head in definite finality.
"No, I don't either. Aunt Hill 'n' I can manage well enough. I guess mother'd be provoked 'most to death if I run round callin' the menfolks in."
"Well, what is it then?" asked Jerry, in palpable disappointment. "What is 't you want me to do?"