"Tess air a-gettin' stylish," said Mrs. Longman, rattling the newspaper one Sunday morning. "Her name air right here, in print."
"What do it say, Mammy?" asked Ezra, lighting his pipe with a piece of burning paper.
"As how Tessie air a-goin' to see her Daddy, with the big man on the hill."
Ben Letts shoved his big boots from one side to the other, plainly disturbed by the news.
"Folks on the hill air a-doin' better if they minds their own business, I air a-sayin'," grumbled he. "There ain't no reason why Orn Skinner can't go dead, like other squatters has before him."
His red bandana handkerchief sought the blurred blue eye. A pair of pale gray ones from above the smoking pipe of Ezra Longman settled upon Ben Lett's face, with a tightening of the thick lids.
"Tessibel air so sure that her father air innocent that I hopes they prove it," Myra Longman said, trundling her babe to and fro, in the huge wooden rocker.
"There be some folks as knows more than they'll tell," put in Ezra, keeping his eyes upon the squatter Ben.