"I could not be induced to part with him, sir," master replied.
"Yes, sir, got a right to think a good deal of him. Goin' to learn him any sort of trade? Strong enough to make a good blacksmith. Owned one about like him once. Swapped him for a woman and a child."
"Why, father," the daughter spoke up, "Dan is Mr. Gradley's body servant."
"Yes, I know," said the old fellow, his cold and speculative eye still bent upon me, "but it wouldn't be out of the way to learn him how to do something. Comes in mighty handy sometimes and we never can tell what mout happen."
The girl winced at the word "mout," unmistakable symbol of the white trash, and smiling to cut a blush in two, she said: "You observe, Mr. Gradley, that father doesn't care how he talks. He fell into the habit of imitating a queer old fellow who lived near us and now he does it unintentionally. Let us go into the house?"
"Yes, come on," old Potter joined in. "Jest as cheap inside as out, and it ain't as tiresome settin' as standin'. Boy, (giving his eye to me again) go round to the kitchen and tell them to give you something to eat."
"We haven't time to stop," Bob interposed. "We expect several friends at dinner, and—"
"Jest as well eat a snack with us," the old fellow broke in. "Jest as cheap and it won't take nigh so long. I reckon I've got as fine a piece of mutton as you ever set your teeth on—sheep that I didn't want to part with but an infernal dog came along this morning and grabbed him and cut his throat as slick as a whistle—and we know how to cook mutton at our house. Come on."
He continued to urge his hospitality, and to praise the sheep that had been killed by a dog, and the girl pleaded with her eyes; and I thought that Bob would waver, he smiled so and bowed so many times, but in the end he was firm, and bade me turn the buggy around. Even then, with his foot on the step, he lingered to speak another word, though never seeming to utter what came into his mind. At last we drove away, and the moment my back was turned, the girl was only a shadow lying across my memory; and it worried me. I could look at as delicate a thing as a flower and in my mind could reproduce its form and its hue, but that woman was a blur to her own image.