You see she is one
of our old neighbours, and--and--well, they hate to be called that--and
they aren't exactly servants."

"Well, I'll get the dinner for her--it's wash day. Don't try to get up,"
Mrs. Hunter said, taking the breakfast away with her.

"Be careful about Hepsie, mother," Elizabeth called after her in an
undertone. "She's a good girl, if you understand her and--and they leave
you at the drop of a hat."

Hepsie's going came sooner than even Elizabeth had feared. She brought a
cup of coffee to her at noon, but avoided conversation and went out at
once.

Elizabeth called her mother-in-law to her after dinner was over and
cautioned her afresh.

"But I haven't had a word with her that was ill-natured or cross," Mrs.
Hunter protested indignantly.

"I don't suppose you have, mother," the miserable girl replied, puzzled as
to how she was to make the older woman understand. "It's--it's a way you
have. I saw that she was hurt about that tinware. She's been very
satisfactory, really. She takes every step off of me that she can. She's
the best in the country--and--and they hang together too. If we lost her,
we'd have a hard time getting another."

"Well, it makes me cross to have to work with them as if they were rotten
eggs and we were afraid of breaking one, but if I have it to do I suppose
I can. I only looked after the clothes to see that she got the streaks out
of them. I knew she was mad about something, but I rinsed them myself; I
always do that."

After Mrs. Hunter was gone Elizabeth thought the matter over seriously.
Neither Hepsie nor any other girl they could get in that country was going
to have her work inspected as if she were a slave. They were free-born
American women, ignorant of many things regarding the finer kinds of
housekeeping in most instances, but independent from birth and
surroundings. In fact, there was a peculiar swagger of independence which
bordered upon insolence in most of the homes from which Kansas help must
be drawn. Elizabeth knew that their dignity once insulted they could not
be held to any contract.

Mrs. Hunter went back to the kitchen and tried to redeem the mistakes she
had made, but Hepsie would not be cajoled and the unpleasantness grew.
Saturday night the girl came to Elizabeth and said, without looking her in
the face at all:

"Jake says, if he can have th' team, he'll take me home. I--I think I
won't stay any longer."

"Do you have to go, Hepsie?" Elizabeth