“Not going! Why you have been lying all your life—you’d lie for a shilling any day—all lies, you mean, miserly liar.”
“Come, Bertha, draw it mild, won’t ye? Did you never hear say o’ the Fairfields that they were a quick-tempered folk? and it’s an old saying, don’t knock a mad horse over the head.”
“It’s true all I said,” she laughed; “and that’s why it stings.”
“And did ye never hear that true jests breed bad blood?” he laughed. “But no matter, I’m not a bit riled, and I won’t. I like ye better for speaking out; I hate that mealy-mouthed talk that fine-spoken folk goes on wi’. I likes a bit of a rub now and then; if ye were too civil I couldn’t speak my own mind neither, and that would never do.”
“Get along with ye. Have you any more to say?”
“Shall I say it out, plain and short, and will ye hear it through?” he asked.
“Ay.”
“Well, here it is; if ye don’t sign that, I think ye’ll be hanged.”
“No, you don’t,” she said, more quietly.
“I do, by ——,” he swore.