But I felt dubersome about her comin' very soon, for she took out her knittin' work (we had to wait quite a good while for the cars), and I see that she hadn't got the first one only to the instep.
It is slow knittin'—shells are dretful slow anyway—and she wuz too proud sperited to have 'em plain clam-shell pattern, which are bigger and coarser; she had to have 'em oyster-shell pattern, in ridges.
Wall, as I say, I felt dubersome, but I spoke up cheerful on the outside—
"If you git your stockin's done, Tirzah Ann, you must be sure and come."
And she said she would.
The way she said it wuz: "One, two, three, four, yes, mother; five, six, seven, I will."
She had to count every shell from top to toe of 'em, which made it hard and wearin' both for her and them she wuz conversin' with.
Why, they do say—it come to me straight, too—that Whitfield got that wore out with them oyster-shell stockin's that he won't look at a oyster sence—he used to be devoted to 'em, raw or cooked; but they say that you can't git him to look at one sence the stockin' episode, specially scolloped ones.
No, he sez "that he has had enough oysters for a lifetime."