A new chill came on when we entered the house and I was presented to its mistress.
"So you 're the boy that's come to work for the doctor, are you?"
"I have come to study with him, ma'am"' was my interior reply, but I was too diffident to say it aloud. Naturally the remark made me very uncomfortable. The doctor did not correct her, and evidently must have told her something different from what he told me. Her tone was even more depressing than her words; it breathed a coldness, not to say harshness, to which I had not been accustomed in a woman. There was nothing in her appearance to lessen the unpleasant impression. Small in stature, with florid complexion, wide cheek bones that gave her face a triangular form, she had the eye and look of a well-trained vixen.
As if fate were determined to see how rapid my downfall should be before the close of the day, it continued to pursue me. I was left alone for a few minutes. A child some four years old entered and made a very critical inspection of my person. The result was clearly unfavorable, for she soon asked me to go away. Finding me indisposed to obey the order, she proceeded to the use of force and tried to expel me with a few strong pushes. When I had had enough of this, I stepped aside as she was making a push. She fell to the floor, then picked herself up and ran off crying, "Mamma." The latter soon appeared with added ire infused into her countenance.
"What did you hit the child for?"
"I did n't hit her. What should I want to strike a child like that for?"
"But she says you hit her and knocked her down."
"I did n't, though—she was trying to push me and fell and hurt herself."
A long piercing look of doubt and incredulity followed.
"Strange, very strange. I never knew that child to tell a lie, and she says you struck her."