“I ought to have been more neighborly,” began Mrs. Wilson, with a twinge of conscience. “I’ve watched you all so long, and you have all improved so much since old Mrs. Brown was here! But everybody seems so engrossed with business!”
“That’s along o’ Dil,” put in Patsey proudly. “When Dil come things was diff’rent. Dil’s got so many nice ways—she allis had.”
“Is your mother dead?”
Dil’s face was full of scarlet shame and distress, but she could not tell a wrong story.
“Her mother ain’t no good,” declared Patsey, in his stout championship; for he did not quite like to tell a lie, himself, to the lady, and he knew Dil wouldn’t. “But Dil’s splendid; and Owny, that’s her brother,” nodding toward him, “is fus’ rate. We’re keepin’ together; an’ little Dan, he’s in a home bein’ took keer of.”
“O Patsey!” Dil flushed with a kind of shamefaced pleasure at his praise.
“So you be! I ain’t goin’ back on you, never.” And there was a little gruffness in his voice as is apt to be the case when a lump rises in a big boy’s throat. “An’ you couldn’t tell how nice she’s fixed up the place—’twas jes’ terrible when she come.”
“But you all helped,” returned Dil.
“And you are all so much cleaner and nicer,” and their visitor smiled.
“Yes; we’m gittin’ quite tony.” Patsey slung out the dishcloth and hung it up, and spread the towel on a bar across the window. Fin and Shorty edged their way out, and Fossett settled to a story paper. Owny wanted to go with the boys, but he compromised by sitting in the doorway.