Jean had begun to resent, but the explanation mollified her.
"More tea," she said quietly, "and you might stir the dregs a mite, Mrs. McAdam; it's plain sinful to let the strength go to waste."
"If I was Theodora Glenn," Mary Terhune went on, monotonously stirring the cold liquid in her cup, "I'd have my eye on that girl of hers."
And now the ingredients were prepared for the mixing!
"What's Priscilla Glenn got to do with Jerry-Jo McAlpin?" Mrs. McAdam asked sharply, fixing her little ferret eyes on the speaker.
Long Jean bridled again and interjected:
"And for why not? Young folks is young folks, and there ain't too many boys for the gels. What with the States and the toll to death, the gels can't be too particular, not casting my flings at Jerry-Jo, either. He's a handsome lad and will get a footing some day. Glenn's girl ain't none too good for him; he'd bring her to her senses. All that dancing and fiddle-scraping at Master Farwell's is not to my liking. The goings-on are evil-looking to my mind. The girl always was a parcel of whim-whams—made up of odds and ends, as it was, of her fore-runners. What all the children of the Glenns might have been—Priscilla is!"
"So Jerry-Jo's fixed his bold eyes on the girl?" asked Mary McAdam. "It bodes no good for her. She's a sunny creature and mighty taking in her ways. I wish her no ill, and I hate to think of Jerry-Jo shadowing her life till she forgets to dance and sing. For my part, I wish the master were twenty-five years younger and could play for the lass to dance to the end of their days."
"And a poor outlook for me!" grumbled Jean humorously. "Another cup of the tea, Mary Terhune, and make it stronger. I begin to feel the bitter in my toes."
And while this talk and more like it was permeating Kenmore, Jerry-Jo, adorned and uncomfortable, did his own thinking and planned his own plans after the manner of his mixed inheritance. He could not settle to any task or give heed to any temptation from the States until he had made Priscilla secure. The girl's age in no wise daunted McAlpin. His eighteen years were all that were to be considered; he knew what he wanted, what he meant to have. He could wait, he could bide the fulfillment of his hopes, but one big, compelling subject at a time was all he could master.