“Tibbie Drinker! A redemptioner!”
“But Janice, he must have been a gentle—”
“What he was, little matters,” interrupted the girl. “He’s a bond-servant now, and even if he were n’t, he’d have a bristly beard—Ugh!”
“Poor fellow,” sighed Tabitha. “’T is not his fault!”
“Nor is ’t mine,” retorted Janice.
A pause of some moments followed and then Janice asked: “Dost think I am promised to Mr. Evatt, Tibbie?”—for let it be confessed that every incident of what she had pledged herself not to tell had been poured out to her confidant.
“I think so,” whispered the girl, “and he being used to court ways would surely know.”
“He ’s—well, he’s a fine figure of a man,” owned Janice. “And tho’ I ne’er intended it, I’d rather ’t would be he than Philemon Hennion or the parson.”
“What if thy father and mother should not consent?” said Tabitha.
“’T would be lovely!” cried Janice, ecstatically. “Just like a romance, you know. And being court-bred, he’d know how to—well—how to give it éclat. Oh, Tibbie, think of making a runaway match and of going to court!”