“It can’t be that Miss Julia’s self is a comin’ can it?” called Joe, for the little house was not set so far back from the road but that he could hear every word spoken between the woman and Brevet.
“Why, did you know Miss Julia?” she asked, stepping at once to the gate, with Brevet following close behind her.
“No, Miss; dat is not personally, but I knowed dat Miss Julia owned dis little plantation, an’ I often wonder dat she never done come to live on it. I can ‘member when her Uncle Dave was livin’, an’ it was den des de homiest little homestead in de country.”
“You have not heard then of Miss Julia’s death?”
“No,” exclaimed Joe, with as much feeling in his voice as though Miss Julia had indeed been an old friend; “you don’ tell me! I’se often heard what a reg’lar lady she was, and often wished I done have a chance to lay eyes on her.”
“She was a very good friend to me,” said the woman, sorrowfully, “and she had expected to come down here this summer and open the house, and bring a little family of city children with her who had never spent a day in the real country in their lives.” "You don’t say so!” said Joe, shaking his head sadly. “It’s strange what times de Lord chooses to call de good folks out of dis worl’.” And then he added, after a moment of respectful silence, “But de place here, am it sold to some new party?”
“No; Miss Julia left it in her will to a young lady who was just the same as a daughter to her, and she has decided to come down in Miss Julia’s place this summer.”
“And bring the little children?” asked Brevet, eagerly.
“And bring the little children,” answered the woman, her face brightening. “I have come down to make everything ready for them, and they are coming on Friday.”
“Oh, do you think I could know them?”