w jest look right here, Miss Joan--ma'm," she cried, flourishing a
cooking spoon to point her words. "I ain't a woman of many words by no
means, as you might say, but what I sure says means what I mean, no
more an' no less, as the sayin' is. I've kep' house all my life, an' I
reckon ther's no female from St. Ellis ken show _me_. I've bin a wife
an' a mother, an' raised my offsprings till they died. I did fer a man
as knew wot's wot in my George D. An' if I suffered fer it, it was
jest because I know'd my duty an' did it, no matter the consequences
to me an' mine. I tell you right here, an' I'm a plain-spoken woman
who's honest, as the sayin' is, I turn out no house, nor room, nor
nothin' of an afternoon. I know my duty an' I do it. Ther's a chapter
of the Bible fer every day o' my life, an' it needs digestin'
good--with my dinner. An' I don't throw it up fer nobody."

"But--but----" Joan began to protest, but the other brushed objection
aside with an added flourish of her spoon.

"It ain't no use fer you to persuade, nor cajole, nor argify. What I
says goes fer jest so long as I'm willin' to accept your ter'ble
ordinary wages, which I say right here won't be fer a heap long time
if things don't change some. I'm a respectable woman an' wife that
was, but isn't, more's the pity, an' it ain't my way to chase around
the house a-screechin' at the top o' my voice jest as though I'd come
from a cirkis. You ain't got your mind on your work. You ain't got
your heart in it, singin' all over the house, like--like one o' them
brazen cirkis gals. No, nor wot with scallawags a-comin' around
sparkin' you, an' the boys shootin' theirselves dead over you, an'
folks in the camp a-callin' of you a Jony gal, I don't guess I'll need
to stay an' receive con--contamination, as you might say. That's how
I'm feelin'; an' bein' a plain woman, an' a 'specterble widow of
George D., who was a man every inch of him, mind you, if he had his
failin's, chasin' other folks' cattle, an' not readin' their brands
right, why, out it comes plump like a bad tooth you're mighty glad to
be rid of, as the sayin' is."

The woman turned back to her cooking. Her manner was gravely
disapproving, and she had managed to convey a sting which somehow hurt
Joan far more than she was willing to admit. Her refusal to undertake
the added work was merely churlish and disconcerting, but those other
remarks raised a decided anger not untouched by a feeling of shame and
hurt