“Miss Stella say she busy tryin’ on a dress an’ she can’t come now.”
Butler turned on Maggie with sudden fury.
“Go back, you little black imp of the devil, and tell her to come down immediately! Immediately, I say!”
“Yassah! Yassah!” Maggie panted. She turned back up the stairs jumping three steps at a time, and fell sprawling across the top landing. She reached Stella’s room gasping for breath.
Stella turned leisurely from her mirror.
“What on earth’s the matter, Maggie?”
“De Jedge say ef you doan come dar dis minute he gwine ter come up here and slap yo head off!”
“As bad as that, Maggie?”
“Yassam. He flung a big book at me an’ hit me right in the head jes case I tell ’im what you say. Didn’t ye hear it?”
Stella continued deliberately curling the ringlets about the edges of her raven hair.