'Yes, I know; I understand,' Jerrie replied, 'I saw it in her face yesterday. She has tired herself out for me, and if she dies I shall hate the room forever.'
'But she will not die; that is nonsense,' Tom began when he was interrupted by Mrs. Crawford, who called out:
'Oh, Jerry, here is Billy Peterkin, with his hands full. What shall I do with him?'
Dashing away her tears, Jerry replied:
'Send him in here, of course.'
In a few moments the dapper little man was in the woodshed, with a large bouquet of hot-house flowers in one hand and a basket of delicious black-caps in the other. For a moment he stood staring first at Tom on the wooden chair glaring savagely at him, and at Jerrie by the washtub with the traces of tears on her face—then, with a wind of forced laugh, he said:
'Be-beg pardon, if I in-tr-trude. Looks dusedly like l-love in a t-t-tub.'
'And if it is, you have knocked the bottom out,' Tom said, with a sneer. Both jokes were atrocious, but they made Jerrie laugh, which was something. She was glad on the whole that Billy had come, and when he offered her the berries and the flowers, she accepted them graciously, and bade him sit down, if he could find a seat.
'Here is one on the wash bench,' she said, 'or, will be when I have emptied the tub;' and she was about to take up the latter, when Billy sprang to her assistance and emptied it himself, while Tom sat looking on, chaffing with anger and disgust.
After a moment Billy stuttered out: