The widow nodded. There was a yearning in her heart to take the wild wood-girl to her bosom and confess that she had already told Bill Paisley too much. But mothers are peculiar creatures. She stifled the impulse and simply said:
“I know what to tell that no-count Bushwhacker, Mary Ann.”
Mary Ann arose and, taking the milk-pails from the shelf, went out to the cow-stable to milk the three spotted cows. Widow Ross got up from the table and looked through the little window across toward Bushwhackers’ Place.
“I don’t blame ’em,” she whispered. “I don’t blame Boy nor Mac nor Paisley nor Declute. I don’t blame any of ’em for not trustin’ them men.”
She turned and went over to the fireplace. On the shelf above it lay her long clay pipe. She picked it up as tenderly as she would a pet.
“He said it was wicked in a woman and mother to smoke. Smythe said that, and I believed him. I’ve been a fool and a ninny—not only for believin’ him, but for denyin’ myself tobaccer all these long days an’ nights. I’ll light up and smoke a while.”
Half an hour later Tommy and Mary Ann came into the house with two pails of foaming milk. Their mother was seated before the blazing log puffing clouds of blue smoke ceilingward. There was an atmosphere of homely tranquillity about the place. Tommy sniffed the air. He had missed the scent of tobacco. Through the open door came draggling a lazy day-breeze from off the Eau. It was sweet and soft with the smell of ripened water-plants.
“Can I go to the Point with ’em to-morrow, ma?” asked the boy.
He had divined that the proper moment for making an exceptional request was now.
“You kin,” answered the mother.