"Don't ask me! Because another sort of religious folk, that go to church regular enough and say their prayers, won't pay honest wages for honest work. How is a woman to live, that can't get more than a third or a quarter the value o' what she does? So they don't live; they die; and that's how it's goin' to be here."
A tear was glittering in Mrs. Marble's honest eyes, while at the same time she bit off her words as if they had been snap gingerbread.
"Is it so bad as that?" asked the visiter.
"Well, I don' know if you ought to call it, 'bad,'" said Mrs. Marble with a compound expression. "When livin' aint livin' no longer, then dyin' aint exactly dyin'. 'Taint the worst thing, anyhow; if it warnt for the folk left behind. If I was as ready as she is, I wouldn't mind goin', I guess. I s'pose she thinks of her child some."
"Would they receive a visit from me?"
"I don' know; but they don't have many. So long as they've been here, and that's more'n a year now, there aint a livin' soul as has called to ask after 'em. I guess they'd receive most anybody that come with a friend's face. Shall I ask 'em?"
"Not that, but if they will see me. I shall be much obliged."
Mrs. Marble laid down her work and tripped up stairs.
"Rotha," she said putting her head inside the door, "here's somebody to see you."
The girl started up and a colour came into her face, as she eagerly asked, "Who?"