Zenie's face wreathed itself in another smile. "I ain' do no mo' wuk—not ontil Zeke he come home."
Mary Louise paused and drew breath. She began again: "If there was somewhere you could put him, someone who could look out for him, or if it was so that you could keep an eye on him yourself—why, you could go to work again, like you used to."
The brightness of Zenie's smile began to fade. "Yas'm. Yas'm, reckon I could." She turned her attention to the child in her arms and her voice, as she continued, was liquid soft. "Zeke's doin' so good—I ain' aim to wuk out no mo'. Jes' keep house heah fo' him."
Then Mary Louise, sensing defeat, struck; struck unerringly for her objective which she judged to be the vulnerable spot; struck with characteristic vigour and direct: "I'll give you six dollars a week if you'll come and do the cooking for Miss Susie, for this summer." She paused and observed the effect.
Zenie had suddenly acquired all the coy graces of a maid receiving a long-expected proposal. She cast her eyes discreetly down, toyed at the rocker edge with her shoe, and smiled.
"You won't have to clean up the house. Landy does that. You won't have to do a single thing but cook." The speech ended with a rising inflection. Mary Louise's eloquent picture inspired even herself with hope.
"Mis' Burrus done offa me seven."
There was a momentary silence, during which time Mary Louise marshalled her routed forces. Directly she gallantly renewed the attack: "I'll give you seven then. And you can have all the time off you want, whenever you get through with the dishes." She had come, in a way, prepared for shocks, but the whirlwind manner of her recklessness was leaving her a bit breathless.
Zenie's face at once assumed a look of concern and lifting her head she pondered far-off possibilities. "Zeke, he home so little," she began, and her voice had an ineffable sadness, "I likes to be home when he come."
"But you can be at home when he comes," Mary Louise explained with a patience which she far from felt. "You can get off directly dishes are done—seven o'clock every evening, I'm sure."