FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88  
89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   >>   >|  
about the room, stepped to the fireplace and picked up a poker--a small one with a crook at the end. "Will this help?" she asked, passing it out. "Eh? the very thing!" He took it, and presently she heard it scraping on the pipe in search of the obstruction. "Cleared it, by Jingo! and that's famous." He lowered himself upon the flat of his broad soles. "You ought to ha' been a plumber's wife. My! if I had a headpiece like that to think for me--let alone to look at!" "Give me back the poker, please." "No tricks, now!" He handed it back, chuckled, and lowering himself back to the topmost rung of the ladder, stood in safety. "You're as white as a sheet. Was you scared I'd fall? Lord, I like to see you look like that! it a'most makes me want to do it again. Look here--" "For pity's sake--" Was the man mad? And how was it he held her listening to his intolerable talk? He was actually scrambling up to the sill again, but paused with his eyes on hers. "It hurts you? Very well, then, I won't: but I owe you something for that slap in the face, you know." "You deserved it!" Hetty exclaimed, flushing as she recoiled from terror to unreasonable wrath, and at the same moment hating herself for arguing with him. "Did I? Well, I bear ye no malice. Go slow, and overlook offences-- that's William Wright's way, and I've no pride, so I gets it in the end. Now some men, after being treated like that, would have sat down and wrote a letter to your father about your goings-on. I thought of it. Says I, 'It don't take more than a line from me, and the fat's in the fire.' Mind, I don't say that I won't, but I ha'n't done it yet. And look here--I'm a journeyman, as you know, and on the tramp for jobs. I push on for Lincoln this afternoon; and what I say to you before leaving is this--you're a lady, every inch. Don't you go and make yourself too cheap with that fella. He's a pretty man enough, but there ain't no honesty in him." He was gone. Hetty drew a long breath. Then, having waited while the ladder too was withdrawn, she fetched back the children and set them before their copy-books. "_Honesty is the best policy_."--She saw Master George fairly started on this text, with his head on one side and his tongue working in the corner of his mouth; and drawing out paper and ink began to write a letter home. "Dear Mother--," she wrote, glanced at George's copy-book, then at the window. Five minutes pa
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88  
89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

ladder

 

George

 

letter

 
Lincoln
 
afternoon
 

journeyman

 
father
 

William

 

Wright

 

treated


thought
 

goings

 

tongue

 

corner

 

working

 
started
 

fairly

 

policy

 

Master

 
drawing

glanced

 
window
 

minutes

 

Mother

 

Honesty

 

pretty

 

offences

 
honesty
 

fetched

 

withdrawn


children

 

waited

 

breath

 

leaving

 

headpiece

 

plumber

 

topmost

 

safety

 

lowering

 

chuckled


tricks

 

handed

 

passing

 

stepped

 

fireplace

 

picked

 
Cleared
 

famous

 

lowered

 

obstruction