"
"Well, we'll spare her for your mother a little while," said Mr. Poyser.
"But we wonna spare her for anybody else, on'y her husband."
"Husband!" said Marty, who was at the most prosaic and literal period of
the boyish mind. "Why, Dinah hasn't got a husband."
"Spare her?" said Mrs. Poyser, placing a seed-cake on the table and then
seating herself to pour out the tea. "But we must spare her, it seems,
and not for a husband neither, but for her own megrims. Tommy, what are
you doing to your little sister's doll? Making the child naughty, when
she'd be good if you'd let her. You shanna have a morsel o' cake if you
behave so."
Tommy, with true brotherly sympathy, was amusing himself by turning
Dolly's skirt over her bald head and exhibiting her truncated body to
the general scorn--an indignity which cut Totty to the heart.
"What do you think Dinah's been a-telling me since dinner-time?" Mrs.
Poyser continued, looking at her husband.
"Eh! I'm a poor un at guessing," said Mr. Poyser.
"Why, she means to go back to Snowfield again, and work i' the mill,
and starve herself, as she used to do, like a creatur as has got no
friends."
Mr. Poyser did not readily find words to express his unpleasant
astonishment; he only looked from his wife to Dinah, who had now seated
herself beside Totty, as a bulwark against brotherly playfulness, and
was busying herself with the children's tea.
Pages:
756
757
758
759
760
761
762
763
764
765
766
767
768
769
770
771
772
773
774
775
776
777
778
779
780