“Shy child, Judge–very shy. Emma let her gather the eggs this morning, she loves to hunt eggs,” chuckled the Captain, “and she went to the loft just before you came in. I clean forgot she hadn’t come down.”
The Captain went on with his work.
“I suppose, Cap,” said Van Dorn quietly, “she heard more or less of what I said.” The Captain nodded.
“How much did she understand?” the Judge asked.
“More’n you’d think, Judge–more’n you’d think. But,” added Captain Morton after a pause, “I know the little skite like a top, Judge–and there’s one thing about her: She’s a loyal little body. She’ll never tell; you needn’t be worrying about that.”
The Judge sighed and added sadly: “It wasn’t that, Cap–it was–” But the Judge left his sentence in the air. The mending was done. The Judge paid the old man and gave him a dollar more than he asked, and went chugging off in a cloud of smoke, while the Captain, thinking over what the Judge had said, sighed, shook his head, and bending over his work, cackled in an undertone, snatches of a tune that told of a land that is fairer than day. He had put together three sprockets and was working on the fourth when he looked up and saw his daughter Emma sitting on the box that the Judge had vacated. The Captain put his hand to his back and stood up, looking at his eldest daughter with loving pride.
“Emma,” he said at length, “Judge Tom says women are like God.” He stood near her and smoothed her hair, and patted her cheek as he pressed her head against his side. “I guess he’s right–eh? Lila was in the loft getting eggs and she overheard a lot of his fool talk.” The daughter made no reply. The Captain worked on and finally said: “It kind of hit Tom hard to have Lila hear him; took the tuck out of him, eh?”
Emma still waited. “My dear, the more I know of women the better I think of God, and the surer I am of God, the better I think of women–what say?” He sat on the box beside her and took her hand in his hard, cracked, grimy hand, “’Y gory, girl, I tell you, give me a line on a man’s idea 342of God and I can tell you to a tee what he thinks of women–eh?” The Captain dropped the hand for a moment and looked out of the door into the alley.
“Well, Father, I agree with you in general about women but in particular I don’t care about Mrs. Herdicker and I wish Martha had another job, though I suppose it’s better than teaching school.” The daughter sighed. “Honest, father, sometimes when I’ve been on my feet all day, and the children have been mean, and the janitor sticks his head in and grins, so I’ll know the superintendent is in the building and get the work off the board that the rules don’t allow me to put on, or one of the other girls sends a note up to watch for my spelling for he’s cranky on spelling to-day, I just think, ‘Lordee, if I had a job in some one’s kitchen, I’d be too happy to breathe.’ But then–”
“Yes–yes, child–I know it’s hard work now–but ’y gory, Emmy, when I get this sprocket introduced and going, I’ll buy you six superintendents in a brass cage and let you feed ’em biled eggs to make ’em sing–eh?” He smiled and patted his daughter’s hair and rose to go back to work. The girl plucked at his coat and said: “Now sit down, father, I want to talk to you,” she hesitated. “It’s about Mr. Brotherton. You know he’s been coming out here for years and I thought he was coming to see me, and now Martha thinks he comes to see her, and Martha always stays there and so does Ruth, and if he is coming to see me–” she stopped. Her father looked at her in astonishment. “Why, father,” she went on,–“why not? I’m twenty-five, and Martha’s twenty-two and even Ruth is seventeen–he might even be coming to see Ruth,” she added bitterly.