"Now why don't you tell me all about it?"
"I don't see the use in my repeatin' suthin' you've already hearn."
"Already hearn? I ain't hearn a word, and you know it. But suppose he do git the app'intment—won't it mean trouble?"
"Wall, I don't know but it will. They do say that it's a sorter troublesome job. Know'd a feller that was app'inted once, and he was shot between the eyes—puttiest shot you ever saw. Man said, 'You couldn't do that ag'in in ten years,' and putty soon thar come along another deputy, an' blamed if he didn't do it ag'in."
"I wish you wouldn't pester me so—when I've already got trouble on my mind."
"What's troublin' you, Margaret?"
"Why, dinner's about ready to take up, and them folks ain't come back. Why, I never did see Lou as skittish as she is now. I reckon it's because he's the son of a United States jedge."
"Oh, you've found out all about him, have you? Wall, he's sorter skittish, too. And when his aunt talks it puts me in mind of a bird a singin' up summers among the green leaves."
"Oh, any woman could talk thatter way if you'd put fine clothes on her. Trouble is when a woman ain't dressed fitten to kill, nobody won't listen to her. Common calico can't talk any better than that Mose Blake; but silk—law me! Sings like a bird up among the green leaves. I despise to hear a man go on thatter way—jest as if a woman ain't respectable unless she covers herself with finery. But I want to tell you that Lou can talk with the rest of 'em when she wants to—and so can I, for that matter."
"Oh, you can talk, Margaret—thar ain't no doubt about that. Well, I'll go out now and see if the hogs air gittin' along all right, and when dinner's ready jest blow yo' ho'n."