"I hope not!" she laughed in return.
"Well," put in Nate, looking from one to the other, "it seems funny to you, I see; but if I ain't much mistooken I've heered the boss, here, talk about young Early more'n once. So they must be something to it, of course."
"There!" said Joyce. "You are convicted, Mr. Dalton. Can you set yourself right?"
"I can, if I may."
"Well, do by all means, then."
"Well, Nate, I began by first being deceived myself; then, being fairly launched in deception, I went on cheating others. There never was a young Early! No man is living by that name, that we know."
Nate looked dazed, and Lucy craned forward anxiously. "Who does own the Works, then?" she cried. "Can't we go on living in our pretty houses, and having the nice new ways? Who built the school, and the church, and the Social-house?"
"Do you like the new, so much better than the old, way, Lucy? You have had great sorrows since these changes, child."
Joyce leaned forward to the girl, kindly.
"I know, but if it had come before! How dreadful hungry and wretched we'd have been! And how would it have gone with Nate? Do you s'pose they'd ever 'a' cleared him, if they hadn't knowed he had rich friends? Oh, I can't bear to think of it before! It's like the diff'runce between being out in the cold and wet, with nobody to care, and being inside by the fire, with ev'rybody good-natured. It's easier with the work, and with the children, and with ev'rybody. There's lots of times, now, when I couldn't help singin', only I'm ashamed to. And 'tisn't me only, but Marry, and Rache, and the youngsters, and all. It's like summer, come to stay."