“What's the matter with Chick?”
“Matter with him?” Myrtella turned on her fiercely. “Ever' thing is the matter with him. What chanct has he got in the world? Picked out of a ash-barrel, livin' in dirt an' ignorance, drinkin' the beer that leaks outen the kegs on the freight cars, hangin' 'round the saloons an' gittin' runtier an' dumber an' more pitifuller every day he lives. My Lord! Ain't that enough the matter with him?”
Miss Lady's quick, eager sympathy leapt into her face.
“We must do something for Chick. Dr. Wyeth believes he can cure him if they can ever get him into the Children's Hospital. Why can't we—” she checked herself, and sat looking off to the hills across the river.
“Myrtella, I've got to tell you something,” she began again desperately, “I've been trying to tell you all day, but I didn't know how. You have been so good to us, all through the Doctor's illness, and before. But I'm afraid after this month we'll have to let you go.”
Myrtella had been threatening to give notice for a month, but at this announcement she looked as if she had been the victim of an unsuccessful electrocution.
“It's a question of money,” went on Miss Lady hurriedly. “You see we simply haven't any. I've kept account of every cent that comes in and goes out, just as Mr. Gooch told me to; but it doesn't balance. We'll just have to keep on cutting down expenses until it does.”
“An' you are going to begin on me,” said Myrtella furiously, “an' git in some onery nigger that'll carry home more in a basket than my wages would come to!”
“No, Myrtella; we are going to try to do the work ourselves.”
“You mean you are! An' Miss Connie'll primp herself up an' go hiking into town after beaux, an' Miss Hattie'll set around with her nose in a book, an' you'll go on workin' an' slavin' an' wearin' yourself to the bone fer them, an' their tribe of prowlin' kin. Where's the money you got for this farm?”