If Mrs. Noble heard this she was above betraying it.
"Fire's laid in the stove, but not lit."
Never a sign.
"Potatoes peeled an' in the saucepan waitin'."
Mrs. Noble looked up. "One half-hour, or maybe three-quarters till I call."
And they were gone, Minnie first like a flash, Izzy next, no loiterer in the house of Mrs. Noble himself if he could help it and only the slower-paced because somebody had to wait for Emmy Lou.
More wonderful day than it had been earlier, sunnier and less frosty. Minnie, whose wrap is disturbingly nearer a sacque than a coat in its scant nature, takes her place on the horse-block at the curb before Izzy's house, and he and Emmy Lou take places either side of her.
Minnie, wonderful Minnie, ten years old and over, knows it all. What, for instance? Everything, anything. Such as this matter she brings up now of brothers and sisters. They are a bad lot. She says so. A sort to stop at nothing even to passing a poorer sister without knowing her on the street! As she went to the grocery with her bucket and oil-can just now, her brother passed her on the street. Minnie heard once of a man. When she takes this tone the time has come to draw closer. ". . . O'Rouke was this man's name. He was rich and g-r-rand. So grand he didn't know his own brothers when he met them on the street. An' his brothers made up their minds they would go to his house an' hide theirselves an' watch him when he counted his money. It was a g-r-rand house. Over the mantelpiece was a picture of his dead mother. Over the piano was a picture of his dead father. Over the what-not was a picture of his wife. Over the sofa was a picture of hisself. An' his four brothers came to hide theirselves an' watch him count his money. The room was dark in all the corners. An' one brother clumb up on the mantelpiece an' hid hisself behind the picture of his mother, an' cut holes th'ough the eyes so his eyes r-o-olling could look th'ough. An' the next brother clumb up on the piano an' hid hisself behind the picture of his father an' cut holes th'ough the eyes so his eyes r-o-olling could look th'ough. An' the next brother clumb up on the what-not an' hid hisself behind the picture of the wife an'——"
Sister appeared around the side of Izzy's house and came through the gate. Even though her finger was in her mouth, when she saw Minnie she looked provocative.
"Go on with the brothers, Minnie," begged Izzy.