‘Matter? Why, you oughtn’t to ask. Look at your daughter—she’s thin, she’s pale, she’s listless. It’s my opinion she’s killing herself over this mission work, as she calls it—worrying herself about a pack of ungrateful varmints that would take a track from her with one hand and pick her pocket with the other.’
Ruth could never convince her mother that her missionary labours did not consist in giving tracts. The old lady would recognize no other process of visiting the poor.
‘Mother,’ she said gently, ‘you wrong my poor friends very much.’
‘That’s right, Ruth, prefer ragged ragamuffins to your mother. If that’s your religion, I’m sorry for you. If you’ve got a tract on honouring your father and mother, I’d recommend you to read it. Wrong your friends, indeed! What are they? A grateful lot, I dare say. Give you all they’ve got, my dear, wouldn’t they? Well, as all they’ve got generally is a fever and a few specimens of natural history, I dare say they would.’
Ruth coloured, and looked pained.
‘Don’t tease the girl so, Mary,’ said Mr. Adrian, looking up from his book. ‘She isn’t well, and you worry her.’
Ruth cast a grateful look at her father, and then crossed the room, and, stooping down over her mother, stopped the sharp retort that was rising to her lips with a kiss.
Mr. Adrian took advantage of the pause.
‘Just listen to this. It’s really very wonderful. Fancy, the Patagonians always sleep with their mouths open. The Rev. Mr. Jones ascertained it for a fact, and he gives the following interesting description of it.’
‘Don’t, John, for goodness’ sake!’ exclaimed Mrs. Adrian, freeing herself from Ruth’s embrace. ‘Have your Patagonians, and welcome, but don’t bother me with them. All I can say is, if the Rev. Mr. Jones went all the way to Patagonia to see the natives keep their mouths open, he’d have done more good by stopping in Whitechapel and teaching the natives there to keep their mouths shut.’