"To choke me, crush me, knock me down and sit on me, were you?
Well, you're to do nothing of the kind. And it's too hot to embrace.
Stand straight and let me look at you. How did you sleep last night?"
"I don't know. Wasn't awake long enough to find out. Oh, Miss Gibbie,
if you were a little girl I'd play all around the green grass with you!
Apple-Blossom Land is the place to play it in, and this is Apple-Blossom
Land! And to think—to think that it is mine!"
"Why not? Why shouldn't what you want be yours? Heaven knows an old house on a hilltop, with some twisted trees on the side and cornfields at the back, isn't much to dance over; but things have in them what we get out of them, and if you will stop hugging me and get me something to sit on I will be obliged."
"Will the rug do?"
"Rug? How could I get up if I every got down? No. Get me a chair. What are you out here for, anyhow? Bugs and bees and birds may like such places, but being a mere human being I prefer indoors."
"Then we will go in. I came out here so as to be not at home if any one came up to see me."
"Hiding, are you? If you don't want to see people, why see them?" She waved her turkey-wing fan inquiringly. "Nonsense such as this will force you on the roof, if you'd say your prayers in private, and you're making a bad beginning. Have you got that list of the councilmen? I want to see it again."
Mary Cary picked up her writing-materials, crumbled the bread and threw it to the birds, and, with arm in Miss Gibbie's, turned toward the house.
"It's on the library table. I've seen every one of them. I'm sure it's going to be all right."
"You are? That's because you are yet young. Never be sure a man in politics is going to do what he says until he does it. When he makes you a promise, just ask him to kindly put his name to it. I'm like a darkey—I've more confidence in a piece of paper with some writing on it than in the spoken word. Men mean well, and they'll promise a woman heaven or hell to get rid of her, but you can't trust them. How about Mr. Chinn?"