“Sphere!” she repeated, sneeringly, “that’s no word I ever heard. ’Pears to me you rich folks make up words to suit yourselves. But if I don’t know ‘sphere,’ I do not know one word, an’ that’s ‘Fiddlesticks!’”
“Well,” replied the Judge, with a polite movement of his head, “your word is a good old English one used by Southey, Thackeray, and others, though I believe it is unknown just how and why it became an expression of contempt.”
“I don’t know what you’re drivin’ at,” replied Airy, wearily, “but I’m goin’ to say my proposition over again: I wants to be a lady!”
The Judge, having heard the announcement before, bore it this time with fortitude.
“An’ what’s more,” she went on, “I wants you to help me.”
“What can I do?” inquired the Judge, in mild surprise.
“You can gab a bit with me now an’ then,” she said, earnestly. “Why, I took to you the first time I see you.”
“Did you,” replied the Judge. “Well—ahem!—I fancied that you were not much taken with me.”
“I was mad with you,” she said, frankly, “mad because I figgered that you was returnin’ Bethany on us. Then I was mad to think you didn’t get mad.”
“Do you get mad easily?”