"And you're goin' to put him in one o' them Homes?"
"Yes, I am. You see for yourself we can't find any place fer him hereabouts."
"Well, I've ben waitin' for days to see what you was goin' to do, and now I'll tell you what I'm goin' to do, if you'd like to know. I'm goin' to keep Timothy myself; to have and to hold from this time forth and for evermore, as the Bible says. That's what I'm goin' to do!"
Miss Cummins gasped with astonishment.
"I mean what I say, Vildy. I ain't so well off as some, but I ain't a pauper, not by no means. I've ben layin' by a little every year for twenty years, 'n' you know well enough what for; but that's all over for ever and ever, amen, thanks be! And I ain't got chick nor child, nor blood relation in the world, and if I choose to take somebody to do for, why, it's nobody's affairs but my own."
"You can't do it, and you sha'n't do it!" said Miss Vilda excitedly. "You ain't goin' to make a fool of yourself, if I can help it. We can't have two children clutterin' up this place and eatin' us out of house and home, and that's the end of it."
"It ain't the end of it, Vildy Cummins, not by no manner o' means! If we can't keep both of 'em, do you know what I think 'bout it? I think we'd ought to give away the one that everybody wants and keep the other that nobody does want, more fools they! That's religion, accordin' to my way o' thinkin'. I love the baby, dear knows; but see here. Who planned this thing all out? Timothy. Who took that baby up in his own arms and fetched her out o' that den o' thieves? Timothy. Who stood all the resk of gittin' that innocent lamb out o' that sink of iniquity, and hed wit enough to bring her to a place where she could grow up respectable? Timothy. And do you ketch him say in' a word 'bout himself from fust to last? Not by no manner o' means. That ain't Timothy. And what doos the lovin' gen'rous, faithful little soul git? He gits his labor for his pains. He hears folks say right to his face that nobody wants him and everybody wants Gay. And if he didn't have a disposition like a cherubim-an-seraphim (and better, too, for they 'continually do cry,' now I come to think of it), he'd be sour and bitter, 'stid o' bein' good as an angel in a picture-book from sun-up to sun-down!"
Miss Vilda was crushed by the overpowering weight of this argument, and did not even try to stem the resistless tide of Samantha's eloquence.
"And now folks is all of a high to take in the baby for a spell, jest for a plaything, because her hair curls, 'n' she's handsome, 'n' light complected, 'n' cunning, 'n' a girl (whatever that amounts to is more 'n I know!), and that blessed boy is tread under foot as if he warn't no better 'n an angleworm! And do you mean to tell me you don't see the Lord's hand in this hull bus'ness, Vildy Cummins? There's other kinds o' meracles besides buddin' rods 'n' burnin' bushes 'n' loaves 'n' fishes. What do you s'pose guided that boy to pass all the other houses in this village 'n' turn in at the White Farm? Don't you s'pose he was led? Well, I don't need a Bible nor yit a concordance to tell me he was. He didn't know there was plenty 'n' to spare inside this gate; a great, empty house 'n' full cellar, 'n' hay 'n' stock in the barn, and cowpons in the bank, 'n' two lone, mis'able women inside, with nothin' to do but keep flies out in summer-time, 'n' pile wood on in winter-time, till they got so withered up 'n' gnarly they warn't hardly wuth getherin' int' the everlastin' harvest! He didn't know it, I say, but the Lord did; 'n' the Lord's intention was to give us a chance to make our callin' 'n' election sure, 'n' we can't do that by turnin' our backs on His messenger, and puttin' of him ou'doors! The Lord intended them children should stay together or He wouldn't 'a' started 'em out that way; now that's as plain as the nose on my face, 'n' that's consid'able plain as I've ben told afore now, 'n' can see for myself in the glass without any help from anybody, thanks be!"
"Everybody 'll laugh at us for a couple o' soft-hearted fools," said Miss Vilda feebly, after a long pause. "We'll be a spectacle for the whole village."