Mrs. Chao was filled with trepidation. Hastily waving her hand, she got to her feet, raised the portiere, and peeped outside. Perceiving that there was no one about, she at length retraced her footsteps. "Dreadful!" she then said to the Taoist matron. "Dreadful! But speaking of this sort of mistress, I'm not so much as a human being, if she doesn't manage to shift over into her mother's home the whole of this family estate."
"Need you tell me this!" Ma, the Taoist matron, at these words, remarked with a view to ascertain what she implied. "Haven't I, forsooth, discovered it all for myself? Yet it's fortunate that you don't trouble your minds about her; for it's far better that you should let her have her own way."
"My dear woman," rejoined Mrs. Chao, "Not let her have her own way! why, is it likely that any one would have the courage to tell her anything?"
"I don't mean to utter any words that may bring upon me retribution," added Ma, the Taoist matron, "but you people haven't got the wits. But it's no matter of surprise. Yet if you daren't openly do anything, why, you could stealthily have devised some plan. And do you still tarry up to this day?"
Mrs. Chao realised that there lurked something in her insinuation, and she felt an inward secret joy. "What plan could I stealthily devise?" she asked. "I've got the will right enough, but I'm not a person gifted with this sort of gumption. So were you to impart to me some way or other, I would reward you most liberally."
When the Taoist matron, Ma, heard this, she drew near to her. "O-mi-to-fu! desist at once from asking me!" she designedly exclaimed. "How can I know anything about such matters, contrary as they are to what is right?"
"There you are again!" Mrs. Chao replied. "You're one ever most ready to succour those in distress, and to help those in danger, and is it likely that you'll quietly look on, while some one comes and compasses my death as well as that of my son? Are you, pray, fearful lest I shouldn't give you any reward?"
Ma, the Taoist matron, greeted this remark with a smile. "You're right enough in what you say," she ventured, "of my being unable to bear the sight of yourself and son receiving insult from a third party; but as for your mention of rewards, why, what's there of yours that I still covet?"