Mrs. Burtsch had ultimately spun her story to a finish. Rose and Beth were yet intent upon cutting out ladies from a magazine. The former paid little attention to what her mother was saying. She had heard it so often that its charm had worn off. As far as Rose was concerned, it fell on dull ears.
Suddenly, Mrs. Burtsch leaned forward and, seizing an end of Eliza’s sewing, took it up critically. “What do you mean to do with it?” she asked. “The tucks hain’t so bad, though the rest does look like it went through the mill. It’s a sin and a shame to throw it away, ‘Liza. I do hope you hain’t going to be wasteful. It always cuts me up to see anything throwed away.”
Her own yard was a waste of weeds. Her household a waste in every way. Hours and hours of each day were spent as she was spending these, at a harangue that did no one any good, which sapped the energy and left no gain whatever.
“I don’t think I’ll grow recklessly extravagant;” replied Eliza. “I’ve worn this white dress for three summers. It’s out at a good many places and I’ve put on just enough flesh to make it too tight over the hips. I’m making it over for Beth. I can get quite a nice little dress for her. The ruffles are just as good as new.” She held up the skirt and looked it over. “There’s plenty of material to make her a nice little dress. I’m relieved at the thought of it. She does need one badly enough, and I could not see my way clear to get her something nice and fine.”
Mrs. Burtsch had been fingering the dress with a hypercritical air. At Eliza’s words, she leaned back in her chair and sighed. That sigh spoke volumes.
“You’re very foolish, Miss Liza. Everyone is saying so and has been saying so ever since Old Prince got away from you. I don’t like to tell you what folks are saying. I never was no hand at carrying news; but I feel that it’s my duty to let you know. That’s what a friend’s for, to set us right when we go wrong. I feel it my duty to tell you.”
“Don’t put yourself out,” said Eliza, biting off a thread closely, and with just a little touch of vindictiveness. “I’ll not treasure it up against you.” She was not angry. Amused came nearest to express her state of mind.
“I wouldn’t be doing right,” continued the visitor in her meek, whining, apologetic voice. “I never set up to be much. I know I hain’t educated, and me and John are poor, but that hain’t anything against us. Being poor hain’t any disgrace, I’ve always tried to do my duty, as I saw it. If I’ve failed it hain’t because I hain’t tried. It hain’t no matter to me how I hate to do a thing or how disagreeable it is, if it’s my duty, I do it. That’s the way I feel about telling you. I hain’t going to shirk my duty by you living alone as you are.”
The meeker Mrs. Burtsch tried to be, the more “hain’ts” she made use of. They were the negative expression of herself and her thoughts. Eliza said nothing at all, but picked her stitches carefully.
“Folks think that you are clean gone crazy about keeping this little girl. It hain’t as though you was a married woman with a man to provide for you. Of course you’ve got money, put out on interest, but moths corrupt and thieves might break in and steal. That means not to count too much on what you’ve laid by.