“He knew next to nowt about him till I towd him,” he said. “Then he came to ax me things an’ foind out more. He knows as much as I do now. Us sits here an’ talks him over.”
Lady Joan still addressed Tembarom.
“What interest can you have in the man who ought to be in your place?” she asked. “What possible interest?”
“Well,” he answered awkwardly, “because he ought to be, I suppose. Ain’t that reason enough?”
He had never had to deal with women who hated him and who were angry, and he did not know exactly what to say. He had known very few women, and he had always been good natured with them and won their liking in some measure. Also, there was in his attitude toward this particular woman a baffled feeling that he could not make her understand him. She would always think of him as an enemy and believe he meant things he did not mean. If he had been born and educated in her world, he could have used her own language; but he could use only his own, and there were so many things he must not say for a time at least.
“Do you not realize,” she said, “that—that you and this boy are taking liberties?”
Tummas broke in wholly without compunction.
“I’ve takken liberties aw my loife,” he stated; “an’ I’m goin’ to tak’ ’em till I dee. They’re the on’y things I con tak’, lyin’ here crippled, an’ I’m goin’ to tak’ ’em.”
“Stop that, Tummas!” said Tembarom, with friendly authority. “She doesn’t catch on, and you don’t catch on, either. You’re both of you ’way off. Stop it!”
“I thowt happen she could tell me things I did na know,” protested Tummas, throwing himself back on his pillows. “If she conna, she conna, an’ if she wun not, she wun not. Get out wi’ thee!” he said to Joan. “I dunnot want thee about the place.”