pikelets as well as her mother; and we'll have out the three china cups;
only grandfather and little Nan must have common ones. I thought I'd
better tell thee; and then thee'lt make haste home from church in the
afternoon.'

'Black Bess isn't a good friend for thee,' answered Stephen, who was
better acquainted with the pit-girl's character than was Martha, and felt
troubled at the idea of any companionship between them.

'But we are to love our enemies,' persisted Martha, 'and do good to them
that hate us. At any rate I asked her, and she said she'd come.'

'I don't think it means we are to ask our enemies to tea,' said Stephen,
in perplexity. 'If she was badly off, like, and in want of a meal's meat,
it 'ud be another thing; I'd do it gladly. And on a Sunday too! Oh,
Martha, it doesn't seem right.'

'Oh, nothing's right that I do!' replied Martha pettishly; 'thee'rt
afraid I'll get as good as thee, and then thee cannot crow over me. But
I'll not spend a farthing of thy money, depend upon it. I'm not without
some shillings of my own, I reckon. Thee should let me love my enemies as
well as thee, I think; but thee'lt want to go up to heaven alone next.'

Stephen said no more, though Martha continued talking peevishly about
Black Bess. She was not at all satisfied in her own mind that she was
doing right; but Bess had met her at a neighbour's house, where she was
boasting of her skill in making pikelets, and she had been drawn out by
her sneers and mocking to give her a kind of challenge to come and taste
them. She wanted now to make herself and Stephen believe that she was
doing it out of love and forgiveness towards poor Bess; but she could not