“Oh, yes, we’re getting quite fashionable,” put in Samantha. “Father ought to set out a hitching-post and a carriage-block, so that we can receive our callers in style. I hope it will be a stone one, dad.”
“And so do I,” broke in Lucinda, angrily, “and then I’d like to see your head pounded on it, for all it was worth.”
“Well, if it was,” retorted Samantha, “it would make a noise. And that’s more than yours would.”
“You shut up!” shouted Ben Lawton, with the over-vehemence of a weak nature in excitement. “Hain’t you got no decency nor compassion in ye? Has she done any harm to you? Can’t you give her a chance—to—to live it down?”
While the echoes of this loud, indignant voice were still on the air, Jessica had pushed her chair back, risen, and walked straight to the door leading up-stairs. She looked at nobody as she passed, but held her pale face proudly erect, though her lips were quivering.
After she had opened the door, some words seemed to come to her, and she turned.
“Live it down!” she said, speaking more loudly than was her wont, to keep her faltering voice from breaking. “Live it down! Why, father, these people don’t want me to live at all!”
Then she closed the door and was seen no more that day.