"Speak, gel; say what you have to say," he muttered.

"It's only a word or two, father--It's just this. Mother's dead, and
in a day or two she'll be buried. You worn't there to bid her good-bye,
and it ain't likely you'll ever meet her again, unless that's true
about the Judgment Day. Maybe it is true, and maybe mother will tell
God some ugly things about you then, father. Maybe you'll see her then
for a minute or two--I can't say."

"Don't," said Granger. "You're awful when you likes, Bet. You has me
down, and you tramples on me. You're a cruel gel, and no mistake."

A derisive smile came to Bet's face.

"Mother's dead and she'll be buried," she continued, in a dry,
monotonous voice. "The money is in the burying club for her, and she
can be laid in the grave decent like. Then me and the boys, Nat and
Thady, we're going away. I wanted to say that--I wanted to say that
your ways aren't our ways, and so we'd best part company; and I wanted
to say here, with you looking at mother's dead face, and her smiling
back at you so awful and still, and the good God, if there is a God,
listening, that I has promised mother that the boys Nat and Thady--the
Cap'n and Gen'ral, as they're called here--shan't larn your ways, which
are bad past belief; so when mother's buried, we're going away. That's
all. You can go to the docks, now."

As Bet spoke she took a little white soft handkerchief, and laid it
gently over her mother's face.

"You can go now," she repeated, and she opened the door for the man,