"Drink it," she commanded, "and then scoot to yer mammy. And—and ye needn't say as how I air a-carin' for another woman's brat, will ye, Ezy?"
"Nope; I ain't a-sayin' nothin' ... I goes home to my mammy."
If Tess had never seen the hue of death upon a human face, she saw it now. The boy rose totteringly, and Tessibel, with a tender expression in her eyes, opened the door.
"Ezy, I's sorry for ye! I's sorry that I slicked the dirty dishrag in yer face. Ye forgives me, don't ye, Ezy?"
"Yep." And Ezra stumbled away.
Tess watched him stagger along the shore through the rain, the shadows of the weeping-willow trees at last swallowing him up.
She turned back into the hut, barred the door, and fed the child with sweetened milk, forcing particles of bread into the yawning throat. Teola had sent the student from her, never to return, yet she fed the child tenderly, tucking it, with its sugar rag, in the warm blanket.
She snuffed the end from the candle, that it might burn brighter, took the little Bible, and sat down to read.
"Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" she haltingly spelled.
Her eyes sought the small outline of Dan Jordan's babe in the bed. She hardly understood Paul's figurative words, but vaguely imagined that the apostle was afflicted with something like the wizened child which had been thrust upon herself.