She shrugged mightily to express the distrust and contempt she could not put into words.
"Boots!" she repeated darkly.
"Well," said Margaret, "they 're very pretty, anyhow."
Fat Mary wrinkled her nose. "Stink," she observed. "Missis smell 'em. Stink like a hell! Missis throw 'um away."
Margaret looked at the stout woman and smiled. Fat Mary's hostility to the Kafir and the aloe plumes and the ticky was plainly the fruit of jealousy.
"I won't throw them away yet," she said. "I want to look at them first. But did you know the Kafir, Mary?"
"Me!" Fat Mary drew herself up. "No, Missis—not know that skellum. Never see him before. What for that Kafir come here, an' bring stink-flowers to my Missis? An' boots? Fool, that Kafir! Fool!"
"All right, Mary," said Margaret, conciliatingly. "Very likely he won't come again. So never mind this time."
Fat Mary smiled ruefully. Most of her emotions found expressions in smiles.
"That Kafir come again," she said thoughtfully, "I punch 'im!"