"I'll be goin' back to the shackt fer if Jim comes along held raise a row fer me talkin' to strangers. You'd think I was looney the way he watches me."
"And is he a stranger to you?"
"Well, to tell the truth my mother and Jim's was cousins, but I never knowed him to be such a poor character as he is, or I'd never have come up here. But I don't have to stay all summer,"' she finished significantly.
"Well, good-bye, and I'll see you soon again," said Cora turning toward her boat.
"Good-bye, miss, but say," and she half whispered, "is that girl dumb?"
Cora burst out laughing. Bess a mute!
"No indeed, but she always lets me do the talking," answered Cora with a sty look at the blushing Bess.
"She has good sense, fer you know how to do it," declared Kate
Simpson.
They could hear her bend the brush as she passed up the narrow way.
"What a queer creature," remarked Bess, when she felt that it was safe to try her voice.