Sarah in the voice and manner of a martyr. "It's rabbits or girls,
one or the other, and if it ain't an old hare it's some light-moraled
critter like Molly Merryweather."

Abel's face had changed to a dull red and his eyes blazed.

"Say anything against Molly, mother, an' I'll never speak to you again!"
he cried out angrily.

"Thar, thar, ma, you an' Abel are too pepper tongued to get into a
quarrel," remarked Abner, the silent, who seldom spoke except for the
promotion of peace. "I'll mend the roof for you whenever you want it."

"I reckon I've got as much right to use my tongue as anybody else has,"
retorted Sarah, indignant because a solution had been found and her
grievance was annulled. "If a girl ain't a fast one that gets as good as
engaged to half the young men in the county, then I'd like to know who
is, that's all?"

Then, as Abel called sharply to his fox-hound puppy and flung himself
from the room, she turned away and went to sprinkle her calla lilies.
There was an agony in her breast, though she would have bitten out her
tongue sooner than have confessed it. Her strength lay in the fact that
never in her life had she admitted even to herself, that she had been in
the wrong.



CHAPTER V