“Well, I care what he says. I’ll see myself knucklin’-down to a mother-in-law!”
“Well, now, don’t go an’ let loose of your temper, or you’ll be sorry fer it. You’re alwus mighty ready a-tellin’ me not to mind what folks say, an’ to keep away from the old gossips.”
“Well, you told me yourself, didn’t you? I can’t keep away from my own mother very well, can I?”
“Well, now, don’t flare up so! You’re worse ’n karosene with a match set to it.”
“What ’id you tell me for, if you didn’t want I sh’u’d flare up?”
“Why, I thought it ’u’d just put you on your mettle an’ show her she c’u’dn’t come it over you.” Then she added, diplomatically changing her tone as well as the subject—“Oh, say, Emarine, I wish you’d go up in the antic an’ bring down a bunch o’ pennyrile. I’ll watch the puddin’.”
She laughed with dry humor when the girl was gone. “I got into a pickle that time. Who ever ’d ’a’ thought she’d get stirred up so? I’ll have to manage to get her cooled down before Orville comes to-night. They ain’t many matches like him, if his mother is such an old scarecrow. He ain’t so well off, but he’ll humor Emarine up. He’d lay down an’ let her walk on him, I guess. There’s Mis’ Grisley b’en a-tryin’ fer months to get him to go with her Lily—Lily, with a complexion like sole-leather!—an’ a-askin’ him up there all the time to dinner, an’ a-flatterin’ him up to the skies. I’d like to know what they always name dark-complected babies Lily fer! Oh, did you get the pennyrile, Emarine? I was laughin’ to myself, a-wond’rin’ what Mis’ Grisley’s Lily’ll say when she hears you’re goin’ to marry Orville.”
Emarine hung a spotless dish-cloth on two nails behind the stove, but did not speak.
Mrs. Endey turned her back to the girl and smiled humorously.
“That didn’t work,” she thought. “I’ll have to try somethin’ else.”