“Yes, they’re put away, back in the woods. You might call that buried. We are just clean broke, Mr. Carington, and that’s all there is to say.”
“I am sorry for you.” And he was, despite all he knew, being a man pitiful of what led to crime or to want. “I shall be very glad to give you help now.”
“The lawyer man he’s coming to-morrow, pretty early. If we ain’t got twenty dollars, the cow must go.”
“Can he take it? I don’t understand that.”
“He says so. I don’t rightly know. We poor folk can’t ever tell. We most always get the worst of it.”
She played her part and told her lie well, looking down as she spoke, and at last wiping her eyes, while Joe uneasily shifted from one foot to another as he stood.
Carington put his hand in his pocket, and took out the roll of notes. As he unfolded them, the woman’s eyes considered them with a quick look of ferocious greed. He counted out twenty-five dollars, and gave the money into her hand, replacing the roll in his pocket as she thanked him. After this he took the bucket, tilted out of it half the water, and, raising it, drank. As he buried his head in its rim, Susan caught Joe by the arm, and pointed to the thirsty man, whose back was toward them. She looked around in haste, took a step toward a broken ax-helve, which lay near by, and then stood still, as Carington set down the bucket. He had been nearer death than he ever knew.
As he turned, the woman’s face again struck him. It was deeply flushed; the large, sensual lower lip was drawn down, so as to uncover a row of large yellow teeth, and the face was stern.
“Thank you, sir,” she said again, quick to notice his look of scrutiny.
“You are welcome. Come, Joe. I want to talk over the lumber.”
As Joe went by her, Susan caught his arm with so fierce a grip that he exclaimed aloud.
“I hurt my foot last week, and I just stumped my toes—that’s all.”
They walked on and reached the house. Here she passed them and went in. While they stood a moment in talk, she moved to the far corner, and took from its rack Joe’s old-fashioned muzzle-loading rifle. She knew that, as usual, it was loaded. Then she hesitated, set it down against the table, and fetched a bowl of milk to the door.
“You might like a drink of milk?” she said. “Come in. It’s good. Dory fetched it; our cow’s run dry. Hers was better anyway. It’s right rich.”