A Lady at Shingle Hut.
Miss Ribbone had just arrived.
She was the mistress of the local school, and had come to board with us a month. The parents of the score of more of youngsters attending the school had arranged to accommodate her, month about, and it was our turn.
And did n't Mother just load us up how we were to behave--particularly Joe.
Dad lumbered in the usual log for the fire, and we all helped him throw it on--all except the schoolmistress. Poor thing! She would have injured her long, miserable, putty-looking fingers! Such a contrast between her and Sal! Then we sat down to supper--that old familiar repast, hot meat and pumpkin.
Somehow we did n't feel quite at home; but Dad got on well. He talked away learnedly to Miss Ribbone about everything. Told her, without swearing once, how, when at school in the old country, he fought the schoolmaster and leathered him well. A pure lie, but an old favourite of Dad's, and one that never failed to make Joe laugh. He laughed now. And such a laugh!--a loud, mirthless, merciless noise. No one else joined in, though Miss Ribbone smiled a little. When Joe recovered he held out his plate.
"More pumpkin, Dad."
"If--what, sir?" Dad was prompting him in manners.
"IF?" and Joe laughed again. "Who said 'if'?--I never."Just then Miss Ribbone sprang to her feet, knocking over the box she had been sitting on, and stood for a time as though she had seen a ghost. We stared at her. "Oh," she murmured at last, "it was the dog! It gave me such a fright!"Mother sympathised with her and seated her again, and Dad fixed his eye on Joe.
"Did n't I tell you," he said, "to keep that useless damned mongrel of a dog outside the house altogether--eh?--did n't I? Go this moment and tie the brute up, you vagabond!""I did tie him up, but he chewed the greenhide.""Be off with you, you--" (Dad coughed suddenly and scattered fragments of meat and munched pumpkin about the table) "at once, and do as I tell you, you----""That'll do, Father--that'll do," Mother said gently, and Joe took Stump out to the barn and kicked him, and hit him against the corn-sheller, and threatened to put him through it if he did n't stop squealing.
He was a small dog, a dog that was always on the watch--for meat; a shrewd, intelligent beast that never barked at anyone until he got inside and well under the bed. Anyway, he had taken a fancy to Miss Ribbone's stocking, which had fallen down while he was lying under the table, and commenced to worry it. Then he discovered she had a calf, and started to eat THAT. She did n't tell US though--she told Mrs. Macpherson, who imparted the secret to mother. I suppose Stump did n't understand stockings, because neither Mother nor Sal ever wore any, except to a picnic or somebody's funeral; and that was very seldom. The Creek was n't much of a place for sport.
"I hope as you'll be comfortable, my dear," Mother observed as she showed the young lady the back-room where she was to sleep. "It ain't s' nice as we should like to have it f' y'; we had n't enough spare bags to line it all with, but the cracks is pretty well stuffed up with husks an' one thing an' 'nother, and I don't think you'll find any wind kin get in.
Here's a bear-skin f' your feet, an' I've nailed a bag up so no one kin see-in in the morning. S' now, I think you'll be pretty snug."The schoolmistress cast a distressed look at the waving bag-door and said:
"Th-h-ank you-very much."
What a voice! I've heard kittens that had n't their eyes open make a fiercer noise.
