"Do what?"
"Why, teach school? I al'ays reckoned that a trade for old persons— toteling poor bodies, 'most past any use except to worrit the children."
"And so 'tis," put in the young sailor angrily.
"Han't been crossed in love, have 'ee? But there! what be I clackin' about, when better fit I was askin' your pardon for bein' so late? I'm sent to fetch you over to Troy. Ought to have been here more'n a half-hour ago; but when you've five children to wash an' dress an' get breakfast for an' see their boots is shined, and after that to catch the hoss and put'n to cart—well, you'll have to forgive it. That's your luggage Tom's carryin', I s'pose?—and a funny passel of traps school teachers travel with, I will say. You must be clever, though; else you couldn't have coaxed Tom Trevarthen to shoulder such a load. He wouldn't lift his little finger for me." She shot this unrighteous shaft with a mischievous side-glance, and laughed. She had beautiful teeth, and laughing became her mightily.
"But that is not my luggage."
"Not your luggage! Then where—Hullo! have you two been quarrellin'? Well, I never! You can't have lost much time about it."
"I left my trunk at the station," Hester went on, flushing yet redder with annoyance.
"And this here belongs to Mother Butson," declared Tom Trevarthen, red also. "I'm fetchin' it home for her."
"Then take and pitch it into the tail of the trap; and you, my dear, hand up your bag and climb up alongside o' me. We'll drive back to station, fetch your trunk, and be back in time to overtake Tom at the top o' the hill and give him a lift home. There's plenty room for three on the seat—that is, by squeezin' a bit."
"You're very kind, Nuncey," said Tom Trevarthen sullenly. "But I'll not take a lift alongside o' she; and I'll not trouble you with my load, neither."