Mrs. Doggett forgot her hurry, and sat down with the child clasped close in her arms.
"Lord, yes, darlin'," she assured her, "and maybe a pieanner, too'll be a settin' in t'other corner o' your parler. I don't never intend these little hands shall ever tech a cow's teat, ner do nary theng that'll rough 'em! I want 'em to be slim and delicate like them little bird claws o' Mrs. Castle's, when you air a grown lady! You won't never thenk hard o' Mammy when she wants you to wear your bonnet clost, and keep your shoes on in summer, will you, honey? She don't want your feet to never git big, and wants you to be raised white complected, agin the time you git to wearin' silk dresses with trails on 'em ever' day!"
Lily Pearl clasped the prospective "bird claws" in a thrill of delight. "Will I have money to buy candy fer Dock and me, when I git big, Mammy?" she queried hopefully.
Mrs. Doggett smiled, as remembering her errand, she put the little girl down. "Lord, yes, you'll be goin' 'round a tradin' in the stores, maybe carryin' a roll o' bills so big a cow couldn't swaller 'em!"
After cautioning the child to watch the fire until her return, with skirts held well aloft, Mrs. Doggett took the path that led over the hill a quarter of a mile to the James' house.
To her infinite satisfaction, while she divested herself of her wraps and her unconventional overshoes on Miss Nancy's kitchen hearth, where that lady sat, with a pressing-board on her lap, and a basket of scraps beside her, Mrs. Doggett learned that Miss Lucy had gone to town with the marketing, and that Mr. Lindsay had ridden to the store, two miles away, for the mail.
"You ain't been up lately, Mrs. Doggett," Miss Nancy remarked, reluctantly drawing her three flat-irons aside, so that her visitor might share a portion of the meagre fire with them: "ain't you been well?"
"Me? No, I hain't been well. I been a complainin' ever sence Christmas, from the top o' my head to the sole o' my foot. I thenk I must have bile on the liver, I complain so much with a ketch in the back."
"Mother used to use plasters for her back, sometimes," observed Miss Nancy.
"These here Polish plasters, I reckon," volunteered Mrs. Doggett: "I've bought 'em too, but they never done me no good. They's a new-fashioned kind o' plasters, I fergit the name. They writ on and wanted Marshall and Dock to be agents fer: I don't know how in the world they ever got holt o' their names. I been aimin' to try them, but a heap o' them remedies hain't nary bit o' count after you pay your money fer 'em.