Thus driven to speak as I thought, I made haste to reply, more delighted with the result of my experiment than I cared to let her know.
"Indeed I do not. I was only talking. It is but selfish, cheating, or ill-done work that the church's Master drives away. All our work ought to be done in the shadow of the church."
"I thought you be only having a talk about it, sir," she said, smiling her sweet old smile. "Nobody knows what this old church is to me."
Now the old woman had a good husband, apparently: the sorrows which had left their mark even upon her smile, must have come from her family, I thought.
"You have had a family?" I said, interrogatively.
"I've had thirteen," she answered. "Six bys and seven maidens."
"Why, you are rich!" I returned. "And where are they all?"
"Four maidens be lying in the churchyard, sir; two be married, and one be down in the mill, there."
"And your boys?"
"One of them be lyin' beside his sisters—drownded afore my eyes, sir. Three o' them be at sea, and two o' them in it, sir."