“I can get a job, anyway,” said the girl.
“Then let me help you on your way. Where do you want to go? Maybe I can pay your fare and you can pay me back when—when you have luck again.”
“Hear that, Barney?” gasped Asa Scruggs. “She’s right. I can’t walk yet.”
“I’m not goin’ to take money from these girls!”
“Only as a loan?” begged Ruth.
“Aw—we’ll never get so we could pay you back,” groaned Barnabetta, hopelessly. “We’re in bad, and that’s all there is to it.”
Mr. Scruggs leaned against the wall and looked at Ruth timidly. Evidently he had been all through the argument with his stubborn daughter already.
“I cannot understand you, Barnabetta,” said Ruth, sadly. “For your father’s sake—at least, let him stay with us till his ankle is better.”
“He can stay,” said Barnabetta, quickly. “If he will.”
“We’ve never been separated yet, miss,” Asa Scruggs said to Ruth, excusingly. “Not since her mother left her to me—a baby in arms.