Mrs. Lovina's answer was somewhat grim and ominous. "I suppose," she wrote, "you think yourself mighty smart, taking off like that. I suppose you think it was kind of respectable, eh, to go away like you done, alone with a feller. I suppose you reckon your going to have high jinks in town there while me and your Pa milks all them cows, well you ain't. Your not of age yet understand, and your pa and me is coming right into the city to get you, one of these days and fetch you strait home, and if you don't get one tanning from your pa that youl remember all your days, my name aint lovina janet nixon, so mind."
"Bad news, bairnie?" Jean enquired; as Daisy, sobered not so much by the letter as by momentary recollection of her past, stared down at the floor in a grave, pondering way.
"Oh—no," Daisy folded up the letter and slipped it into the bosom of her dress, "not exactly. Is the broth cool now, Jean?"
"Ay," said Jean, picking up the bowl and the plate of crackers; "Come on. The Mistress is lyin' in Sir Thomas' room. I had him move his ugly carcass out of it, because it's the best-ventilated room in the hoose—the best o' the worst, like. He didna object, at least naething to speak of. He kenned fine I'd have taken the besom tae him without much encouragin'.... Ey, what d'ye think, now, I caught him sayin' tae her, one time when I came in to red up the room. He was standin' by the bedside, with his hands in his pockets and his feet spraddled out, in yon way he has.
"'We-ell, Marth',' he oppens up, in his big healthy blat, 'har yuh feelin'? Uh?'.
"'Poorly, Tom, very poorly,' says the good leddy—puir soul!—in a faint-like voice.
"'Thaat's ba-ad,' he says, suckin' his teeth like somebody chirpin' tae a pair o' horses, 'but anyway, I guess, Marth', it's time you was restin' under the sod. You've done your share o' this world's toughin' it. You've aimed the right to rest, if anybody hezz. Ever'thin' wurks furr th' best. Y'see that, don't yuh, Marth'-girl? Uh?'
"Juist then I cam up and gied him a push from behind. Ey, a bonny push! 'Get oot!' I says, chokin'-like. I was sae blind mad, I could ha' stranglit yon man, then and there, so I could. Weel, he went!"
The great muscles on Jean's arms were knotted into ribs and ridges like a man's; her chin was thrust out; her eyes were narrowed into shining slits. Her whole strong frame seemed to become a banked fire of indignation, as memory recalled that scene in the sickroom.