“Let me finish milkin',” Pole said. “An' you go in an' git my mush ready.” He took the pail and sat down on an inverted soap-box. “I'll make up fer that calf's stealin' or I'll have old Lil's bag as flabby as an empty meal-sack.”
In a few minutes he followed Sally into the kitchen where she had his simple supper ready for him. When he had eaten it, he led her into the living-room and they sat down before the fire. It was only for a moment, though, for she heard little Billy talking in his sleep and sprang up and went to him. She came back to her chair in a moment.
“The very fust spare money I git,” she said, “I'm goin' to have panes o' glass put in that window in thar. I keep old rags stuffed in the holes, but the rain beats 'em down, and hard winds blow 'em out. It don't take as much fire-wood to keep a tight house warm as it does an open one like this.”
“Sally, we ought to live in a great big fine house,” he said, his eyes on the coals under the red logs.
“I say!” she sneered. “I've been afeard some'n' mought happen to drive us out o' this 'un. Pole, to tell the truth, I've been worryin'.”
“You say you have, Sally?”
“Yes, I worry all day, an' sometimes I wake up in the night an' lie unable to sleep fer thinkin'. I'm bothered about the debt you owe Floyd & Mayhew. It's drawin' interest an' climbin' higher an' higher. I know well enough that Nelson wouldn't push us, but, Pole, ef he was to happen to die, his business would have to be settled up, an' they say Mr. Mayhew hain't one speck o' mercy on pore folks. When it was reported that some'n' had happened to Nelson a while back, I was mighty nigh out o' my head with worry, but I didn't tell you. Pole, we've got to git free o' that debt by some hook or crook.”
“I think we kin manage it,” Pole said, his eyes kindling with a subtle glow.
“That's the way you always talk,” Mrs. Baker sighed; “but that isn't payin' us out.”
“It comes easy to some folks to make money,” Pole said, with seeming irrelevance; “an' hard to others. Sally, did you ever—have you ever been on Colonel Price's plantation?”