"That's silly, Donelle. When he came to his senses, he saw he'd be mobbed if he didn't."
"Oh! Mamsey, you bullied him outrageously. And who sees to old Pierre?"
"You, child. You can't see your husband's father want, when it's rheumatism, not bad whiskey, that's laying him low."
"Oh! Mamsey! And who got Marcel little flags to put on—on those graves on the hill because it would make her feel proud?"
"Donelle you are daft. Marcel felt she had to do something to make it her war, too, and she's too busy to weave and knit. Why"—and here Jo turned to Law whose eyes were twinkling through the smoke that nearly hid his face—"in old times the people around here used to light fires on St. John's Day in front of their houses, to show there had been a death. I told Marcel about that and she herself thought of the flags. She would have given her children if they had lived; she's brought herself, like the rest of us, to see there is nothing else to do but give and give!"
Mam'selle choked over her hurried words and Law suddenly changed the subject.
"Mam'selle," he asked, "is there a chimney place behind this red-hot monster?" he kicked the stove.
"There is, Mr. Law, one about twice too large for the house."
"Let's take the stove down and have the chimney place!"
"Take the stove down?" Jo dropped ten stitches. "Take that stove down! Why, you don't know what it cost me! I—I am proud of that stove."