“Shucks! I’ll wear one every day.”
“I’m goin’ to give up homespun. Calico’s a sight prettier an’ we can afford it. We’re real forehanded now, Abel.”
“Hello! Here comes Kit. Let’s ask her about the tavern. She’s got more sense in her little finger than most folks have in their whole bodies. She’s a different woman than she was before Wahneeny died. I shall always be glad you an’ her was reconciled when you parted. Hum, hum. Poor Wahneeny! Poor old Doctor! Well, it can’t be very hard to die when folks are as good as they was. Right in the line of duty, too.”
“Yes, Abel; but all the same I’m satisfied to think our duty laid out in the woods, takin’ care Kit’s children, ’stead of here amongst the sickness. Wonderful, ain’t it, how our girl came through?”
“She’ll come through anything, Sunny Maid will; right straight through this open door into her old Father Abel’s arms, eh? Well, my dear, what’s the good word? How’s Gaspar and the youngsters?”
“Well, of course. We are never ill; but, Mother Mercy, I heard you were feeling as if you hadn’t enough to do. I came in to see about that. It’s a state of things will never answer for our Chicago, where there is more to be done than people to do it. Didn’t you say you had a brother out East who was a miller?”
“Yes, of course. Made money hand over fist. He’s smarter ’n chain lightning, Ebenezer is, if I do say it as hadn’t ought to, bein’ I’m his sister.”
“Well, I’d like his address. Gaspar wants him here. We must have mills. The idea of our using hand-mills and such expedients to get our flour and meal is absurd for these days.”
“Pshaw, Kit! ’Tain’t long since I had to ride as far as fifty miles to get my grist ground, and when I got there there’d be so many before me, I’d have to wait all night sometimes. ‘First come first served’ is a miller’s saying, and they did feel proud of the row of wagons would be hitched alongside their places. I——”
“Come, Abel, don’t reminisce. If there’s one thing more tryin’ to a body’s patience than another, it’s hearin’ about these everlastin’ has-beens.”