"If you please, ma'am, I am Joy. I go to school with Bertha, and she has been home to tea with me and Uncle Bobo, and I have brought her back."
"She does not want bringing," was the sharp reply; "she can bring herself, I suppose. Go round to the back door, will you?"
"I think I had better not," Joy said with emphasis, "because you do not wish me to come into your house."
Mrs. Skinner had been standing motionless at the door while Joy was speaking, and there was a strange expression on her sharp thin features.
"Where do you say you live, child?"
"I live with Uncle Bobo, in the row, opposite Miss Pinckney and Mrs. Harrison. Miss Pinckney keeps the milliner's shop, where the widows' caps hang up."
"I know," was the reply; "I never bought any article there, and I never mean to. Well, you may run round with Bertha for a few minutes."
"Thank you," Joy said. "I hope you'll let Bet come to tea again; and if you'd like to come too, I am sure Uncle Bobo wouldn't mind."
"I don't spend my time gadding about taking tea with folks. I leave that to drones, who've got nothing better to do. Did you say, child, you lived with Boyd, at the instrument shop?"
"Yes, ma'am; he's my uncle."