Mauney nodded and smiled, for it was common knowledge that the son of Miss Lizzy Hawkins could not claim, with any degree of accuracy, the paternal factor of respectability enjoyed by most children.
“Wal,” she resumed, her eyes returning to the line of her knitting, “young Hawkins was a-playin’ in the road out here after school. Along comes William Henry McBratney drivin’ the old, grey horse. He sees the Hawkins boy and he pulls up and he says, says ’e, ‘Where’s your father, you young brat!’ Young Hawkins, of course, didn’t know him—hasn’t brains enough to know anybody, but, after a minute of heavy thinkin’ he looks up at McBratney and he says, says ’e, ‘Maw told me, me father was down in South Americky workin’ on a steam roller, but I heard her tellin’ me grandmother as how me father’s name is William Henry McBratney!’”
Mauney laughed as Mrs. Fitch soberly glanced over her spectacles again.
“And then,” she resumed, “old William Henry leans half out of his buggy, waving his whip and shouting, without knowing as how he had an audience: ‘Tell yer mother to keep her damned mouth shut, you brat!’
“I guess it’s true enough,” she went on presently, pulling a string of yarn from the revolving ball in her lap. “And then people talk about Dave McBratney for getting converted. It was the best thing he ever done! If I was a son of William Henry’s I’d get converted before you could say Jack Robinson.”
Mauney had never so little enjoyed talking with Jean Byrne as to-night. The episode of Sunday evening had left a distasteful flavor in his mind, for, although he tried to forget it, the incident kept flashing back upon his memory. He was left alone on the verandah with her presently, and immediately felt an awkwardness, hard to overcome. Hitherto, she had always been just his teacher. But to-night, dressed in a yellow-flowered frock, with a pale yellow ribbon holding her dark hair down on her brow, she had lost a quality of dignity. He noticed also a hundred fine lights of tenderness in her eyes that he had never seen before.
He talked with her a few minutes and gave back the history.
“Let me get you another book,” she said, starting toward the door.
“Please don’t bother—just now, Miss Byrne,” he said.
“Why not, Mauney?”