"An' is yo' got a step-mothah?"
"No," said Patsy Ann, "I ain' got none now, but I's sut'ny 'spectin' one."
"What you know 'bout step-mothahs, honey?"
"Mis' Gibson tol' me. Dey sho'ly is awful, missus, awful."
"Mis' Gibson ain' tol' you right, honey. You come in hyeah and set down. You ain' nothin' mo' dan a baby yo'se'f, an' you ain' got no right to be trapsein' roun' dis away."
Have you ever eaten muffins? Have you eaten bacon with onions? Have you drunk tea? Have you seen your little brother John taken up on a full bosom and rocked to sleep in the most motherly way, with the sweetness and tenderness that only a mother can give? Well, that was Patsy Ann's case to-night.
And then she laid them along like ten-pins crosswise of her bed and sat for a long time thinking.
To Maria Adams about six o'clock that night came a troubled and disheartened man. It was no less a person than Patsy Ann's father.
"Maria! Maria! What shall I do? Somebody don' stole all my chillen."