“Tell her that even though we do not keep the child, we shall still be interested in her,” said the Judge.
Titus, in slight embarrassment, again cried in her ear, “Maybe we can get her a good home somewhere else.”
“Good home!” replied Mrs. Tingsby, “yes, yes, I know—the Lord will bless you for that.”
“I guess your mamma is pretty deaf to-day, isn’t she?” asked Titus, patiently, of one of the older children.
The children were all staring rather disdainfully at him and his grandfather. They did not lack smartness, and they had jumped to the conclusion that the Judge’s visit meant that he was tired of Bethany and wanted to return her.
“I’ll make her hear,” said the eldest girl, grimly, and she applied her lips to her parent’s ear, and, without making a steam whistle of herself, as poor Titus did, she said, in a low, blood-curdling tone, “The gemman is tired of Bethany—wants to return her like a parcel sent on approbation.”
Mrs. Tingsby, who had more of the milk of human kindness than this particular one of her offspring, turned to the Judge with an amazed, reproachful air. “Be that true, sir?”
“No,” said the Judge, stoutly, “it isn’t.”
Immediately there ensued an altercation between him and the smart girl. To his own great confusion and astonishment, he, Judge Sancroft, leading citizen of Riverport, actually found himself bandying words with a saucy little shopgirl, for such she appeared to be—and she got the better of him.
At last he appealed to the boarders. “Can’t some of you explain how matters are? The child is a charming little creature. I have no wish to bring her back. I will see that she is comfortably placed.”