"
We did n't say anything.
She was n't much of an eater. School-teachers are n't as a rule. They
pick, and paw, and fiddle round a meal in a way that gives a
healthy-appetited person the jim-jams. She did n't touch the fried
pumpkin. And the way she sat there at the table in her watch-chain and
ribbons made poor old Dave, who sat opposite her in a ragged shirt without
a shirt-button, feel quite miserable and awkward.
For a whole week she did n't take anything but bread and tea--though there
was always plenty good pumpkin and all that. Mother used to speak to Dad
about it, and wonder if she ate the little pumpkin-tarts she put up for
her lunch. Dad could n't understand anyone not eating pumpkin, and said
HE'D tackle GRASS before he'd starve.
"And did ever y' see such a object?" Mother went on. "The hands an' arms
on her! Dear me! Why, I do believe if our Sal was to give her one
squeeze she'd kill her. Oh, but the finery and clothes! Y' never see the
like! Just look at her!" And Dad, the great oaf, with Joe at his heels,
followed her into the young lady's bedroom.
"Look at that!" said Mother, pointing to a couple of dresses hanging on a
nail--"she wears THEM on week-days, no less; and here" (raising the lid of
a trunk and exposing a pile of clean and neatly-folded clothing that might
have been anything, and drawing the articles forth one by one)--"look at
them! There's that--and that--and this--and----"
"I say, what's this, Mother?" interrupted Joe, holding up something he had
discovered.
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