I had felt obligated to swaller a few spoonfuls o' the salted custard when she'd be lookin' my way, an' I felt like ez ef I was pizened, an' so I thess took the painkiller ez a sort o' anecdote.
Another way Mary Elizabeth shows sense is the way she accepts discipline from the ol' nigger, Dicey.
She's mighty old an' strenuous now, Dicey is, an' she thinks because she was present at Sonny's birth an' before it, thet she's privileged to correct him for anything he does, and we've always indulged her in it, an' thess ez soon as she knowed what was brewin' 'twix' him an' Mary Elizabeth, why, she took her into the same custody, an' it's too cute for anything the way the little girl takes a scoldin' from her—thess winkin' at Sonny an' me while she receives it.
An' the ol' nigger'd lay down her life for her most ez quick ez she would for Sonny.
She was the first to open our eyes to the state of affairs 'twixt the two child'en, that ol' nigger was. It was the first year Sonny went North. He had writ home to his ma from New York State, and said thet Mr. Burroughs had looked over his little writings an' said they was good enough to be printed an' bound up in a book.
Wife, she read the letter out loud, ez she always done, an' we noticed thet when we come to that, Mary Elizabeth slipped out o' the room; but we didn't think nothin' of it tell direc'ly ol' Dicey, she come in tickled all but to death to tell us thet the little girl was out on the po'ch with her face hid in the honeysuckle vines, cryin' thess ez hard as we was. So then, of co'se, we knowed that ef the co'se of true love could be allowed to run smooth for once-t, she was fo'-ordained to be our little blessin'—an' his—that is, so far as she was concerned.
Of co'se we was even a little tenderer todes her, after that, than we had been befo'.
That was over five year ago, an' th' ain't been a day sca'cely sence then but we've seen her, an' in my jedgment they won't be nothin' lackin' in her thet's needful in a little wife—not a thing.
Ef they's anything in long acquaintance, they've certainly knowed one another all the time they've had.
Of co'se Mary Elizabeth, she ain't to say got Sonny's thoughts, exac'ly, where it comes to sech a thing ez book-writin', but he says she's a heap better educated 'n what he is.