“If they do,” said Joslin, “I’m ready to go. I tell you, times have changed in these hills.”
“Huh!” began his wife again. “Ye’re takin’ a heap on yoreself, seems to me, Davy Joslin. I reckon ye think ye done all this—in two year!”
“No, I don’t think so, Meliss’. I think the Lord did it.”
“And yet ye hain’t set up fer preachin’ yit! How’d ye come through school, anyhow? I’ll bet ye’re pore as Job’s turkey right now.”
“I’m worse than that, Meliss’. I’ve got nothing.”
“That’s it! That’s right!” went on his wife heatedly. “Hit’s what I expected. Ye’d let us starve. Well, I’ll fix ye anyhow.”
“What do you mean, Meliss’?” asked David Joslin curiously. Under his words now, gentle as they were, was the fierceness of the mountaineer, jealous of any liberties taken with him.
“Well,” she said, “ye quit me. Ye done left me fer full two year.”
“No, I didn’t, Meliss’. I didn’t quit you for two years. I told you when I left it was for all my life.”
“Yes, an’ that throwed her on my hands,” growled Granny Joslin. “Still, I wouldn’t complain if it hadn’t been them Gannts stole eight or ten hawgs off en us last year.”