"Because mother's not home. Besides, if I do get sick, I'll want Effie to take care of me."
This last was too sound a reason for Willie to gainsay, so Margery called Effie to the kitchen door.
"Blackberryin'! And in the sun!" Effie repeated, when Margery had delivered herself. "Well, I guess not! Here you are just stuffed full of ripe bananas and you want a-go out trampin' in the sun! Not much! You stay right where you are, me lady, and take care o' yourself."
"You see," Margery explained to Willie Jones.
"Aw, rats!" that young gentleman exclaimed, turning a hostile front toward the kitchen door. "Come on, Margery. What do you care what Effie says? She's nuthin' but an old hired girl! I wouldn't let any old hired girl boss me around!"
"Any old—what?" gasped Effie, her face turning red and her eyes opening wide with horror.
"Any old hired girl!" Willie Jones repeated defiantly. "Ain't she nuthin' but an old hired girl, Margery?"
It was a question Margery had never before considered. To her Effie had always been merely Effie—merely the person who cooked and sewed and swept and waited on table and combed your hair and buttoned your dress and did all the thousand and one things about the house that had to be done and always were done. She was merely Effie and, come to think of it, she must be the hired girl, for in every house in the neighborhood the person who did the things or a few of the things that Effie did was undoubtedly the hired girl. And if you are a thing, what's the sense pretending you aren't? Margery did not wish to offend Effie, but facts is facts.
"Of course Effie's our hired girl."
For a moment Effie looked hurt enough for tears.