"'Oh, please, sir, don't: you'll make me drop my eggs.' And he looked as ashamed as I ever see a man. And he put her bonnet right back on her head agin, and sez he:—
"'Let me carry 'em: won't ye, sis?'
"Ye see she wouldn't let me so much's touch the basket all the way, though I kept askin'. She said she was goin' to carry it always, an' she might as well begin; an' it wan't heavy; but I know 'twas, for all her sayin' 'twan't, heavy, that is, for her little pipes o' arms.
"'No, thank you,' said she to Jake: 'Billy wanted to carry them for me; but I wouldn't let him. I like to carry them all the way myself, to see if I can. I'm going to come every week, perhaps twice a week.'
"'Be ye?' said Jake. 'Whose little gal are ye, and where do ye live?'
"Then I told him all about her folks; and all the rest o' the men they walked along with us 's quiet and steady you wouldn't ha' known 'em; and Jake he took her right into that Swede's house, you know: Jan, the one that boards some o' the hands."
"Oh, yes!" said Lucinda; "and Ulrica, his wife's the nicest woman among the whole set."
"Well," continued Billy, "Jake he took her right in there. 'Jan'll buy all your eggs,' sez he: 'he's allers wantin' eggs.' I followed on: Nelly she was goin' with Jake, jest as if she'd ha' known him all her life; but she looked back, an' sez, in that little voice o' hern, jest like the sweetest fiddle I ever heard:—
"'Come along, Billy,' sez she, 'and see if I can't sell eggs.'
"An' as soon as she got inter the house, she walked right up to Ulrica, and held out her basket, and sez:—