Mrs. Mumpson had got out of her way as a minnow would shun a leviathan. "May I ask your name?" she gasped.
"Viggins, Mrs. Viggins."
"Oh, indeed! You are a married woman?"
"No, hi'm a vidder. What's more, hi'm cold, and drippin', an' 'ungry. Hi might 'a' better stayed at the poor-us than come to a place like this."
"What!" almost screamed Mrs. Mumpson, "are you a pauper?"
"Hi tell ye hi'm a vidder, an' good as you be, for hall he said," was the sullen reply.
"To think that a respecterbly connected woman like me—" But for once Mrs. Mumpson found language inadequate. Since Mrs. Wiggins occupied the rocking chair, she hardly knew what to do and plaintively declared, "I feel as if my whole nervous system was giving way."
"No 'arm 'll be done hif hit does," remarked Mrs. Wiggins, who was not in an amiable mood.
"This from the female I'm to superintend!" gasped the bewildered woman.
Her equanimity was still further disturbed by the entrance of the farmer, who looked at the stove with a heavy frown.