“Just a little,” said Bill.
“Hand it here, then,” cried Joe with a virtuous air; “we’ll drink Mrs Crumpler’s health.”
“Well,” said Mrs Frost, turning away with an indignant air, “I wouldn’t like to have Mrs Crumpler’s conscience, however plucky she mid be. A body would have thought ’twas bad enough to have a drunken husband wi’out teachin’ other folks to get into bad ways. Drink her health, indeed! Somebody did ought to speak to her.”
The suggestion was warmly taken up, and a select deputation of three immediately turned their steps in the direction of Mrs Crumpler’s cottage.
The matron with the basket, one Mrs Dewey by name, had volunteered to be spokeswoman; but she stopped short in the open doorway conscious of a certain diffidence, for Mr Crumpler, very pale in complexion and watery about the eyes, was up and seated in his elbow-chair by the fire.
Sally, who with a flushed and tired face was making hasty preparations for dinner, turned as Mrs Dewey paused on the threshold, and smiled cheerfully.
“Come in, do, Mrs Dewey, I haven’t a minute to shake hands—I be terr’ble busy. There, my poor husband did have a accident last night, an’ I be takin’ his place in the hay-field.”
“So we heared,” rejoined Mrs Dewey sedately.
She stepped in, followed by Mrs Frost and Jenny Weatherby, the remaining member of the deputation, a spinster with a father just as troublesome as anybody else’s husband. All took their seats in response to a hurried wave of Mrs Crumpler’s hand.
“Oh, ye’ve heared!” said Sally, looking from one to the other with a somewhat awkward laugh.