I can see them,” declared Cora, without trying to hide her distaste for the woman’s rudeness to Rose. “How many tally-sticks did you get to-day?” she asked the girl.
“Oh, she don’t get any,” spoke the woman. Rose never raised her eyes. “Them two girls have me robbed with their eatin’ and drinkin’ and airs. I have to take care of them – they’re me own sister’s children,” and she raised the hem of her dirty apron to her eyes.
“But they help you,” insisted Cora. “They pick berries all day, do they not?”
“Help me?” came with a sneer. “I would like to see how! There’s shoes to be bought, clothes and all sich. Then, butter is high, and them girls must have butter on their bread.”
“When we don’t get anything else,” spoke up Rose, boldly.
“What!” called the aunt, her eyes flashing angrily. “That’s the way I’m thanked! Go up to the house, and wash them dishes, and don’t you leave the house till – I’ve talked with you,” she commanded. “It’s a hard job to bring up somebody else’s children,” and she tried to sigh, “but I am bound to do my best by ’em.”
Bess and Belle seemed actually frightened. They did not venture under the roof of the shack, but stood at the door with eyes staring. Rose passed out, and, as she did so, she winked at Belle. Belle gave a friendly little tug at the brown apron as it passed, and then Bess went inside, at Cora’s request, to select her crate.
Four very small boys slouched up the path to the shed. Their crates were full and they seemed ready to drop down from exhaustion. One, with fiery red hair, pushed his way ahead of the others and presented his tray to the woman. She surveyed it critically, then said:
“Andy, did you swipe a bunch of tallies this morning?”
“I did not!” replied the little fellow indignantly.
“How many you got?” she demanded.
He dug his dirty, brown hands down deep into his trousers pockets. Then he brought up three bunches of the tally-sticks.
“Humph! I thought so,” said the woman. “Do you mean to tell me a monkey like you can pick ten an hour?”
“He’s the best picker on the patch,” spoke up another lad, “and I was with him when he brought each tray in!”
The girls stood back, deeply interested. The woman took the tray from Andy and turned away without offering the ten little sticks which represented the gathering of ten quarts of berries.
“Where’s my tallies?” he demanded.
“You – jest – w-a-i-t,” drawled the woman.
The other boys stepped back. Evidently they were going to “stick by Andy.”
“I’ll give you your crates, and let you go, young ladies,” said the woman to Cora. “These little rowdies ain’t no fit company for customers in automobiles.”
“Oh, indeed we are enjoying looking around,” declared Cora. “Do give the boys their checks, and let them go back to the patch. They are wasting time.”
Thus cornered, the woman was obliged to go on settling with the pickers.
“Well,” she said, “I’ll give you credit, Andy, until I get a chance to look it up. Here, Narrow (to a very tall boy), gi’me yourn.”
“Nope!” replied the tall boy. “We waits fer Andy.”
“Well, I’m blowed!” exclaimed the woman. “If you kids ain’t got a cheek! I’ve a good mind to chase every one of yer.”
Andy stepped back to where she had deposited the box.
“Here!” she called, entirely forgetting the presence of the motor girls. “Git out of here!” and at that she struck the little fellow a blow on the head that caused him to reel, and then fall backward into an open crate of fresh berries!
“Now you’ve done it!” yelled the woman. “You have mashed every one of them! There!” and she dragged him to his little, bruised feet. “Do you think I can sell stuff like that! Mush! Every red berry of ’em!”
“Oh, make her stop!” pleaded Bess to Cora. “She may strike him again.”
“What will you do with that crate of berries?” asked Cora, pushing her way between the angry woman and the frightened boy.
“Make him pay fer ’em, of course,” shouted the tyrant. “And serves him right, too, for his imperdence!”
Big heavy tears plowed their way through the dirty little spots on the boy’s cheeks. To pay for the crate would take all his week’s earnings.
“You did it yourself!” declared a boy who boldly faced the woman, “and Andy’s not goin’ to stand fer it, or we all strike; don’t we, fellers?”
“Sure, we do!” came a chorus, not only from those who had been waiting, but from a second group that had come up in the meantime.
“Strike, eh?” cried the woman. “Well, you kin all clear out! Do you hear! Every dirty one of ye! Git off the place or – I’ll let the dogs loose!”
“Oh, goodness me!” exclaimed Bess, clutching Cora’s sleeve. “Do come away! There will be – bloodshed!”
“We must wait,” replied Cora calmly. “I guess she is not so anxious to have her berries rot on the vines, and most of the good pickers seem to be with Andy.”
Belle was nervously walking down the path toward the autos.
The boys stood defiantly, waiting for the woman to produce Andy’s tallies.
“Give him his sticks,” called one of them, “or we’ll smash every berry in the patch!”
“You will, eh!” yelled the woman. “I’ll show you!”
“Oh, Cora!” cried Bess, but Cora was too much interested in the boys to heed.
The woman left the shed and ran toward the house.
“She’s after the dogs!” shouted one boy.
“Come ahead, fellers!” called another, and at that a dozen or more lads ran wildly through the patch; crushing the ripe luscious fruit as they went. Nellie, who was still picking berries, jumped up from her work. She saw the savage dogs tear away from their kennels, their chains rattling as the woman snapped them from the collars.
Bess and Belle ran to Cora within the shed.
“Here, Nero! Nero!” suddenly called Nellie. “Here Tige! Here Tige!”
Wonder of animal instinct! Those two dogs forgot the commands of the woman to “Sic ’em!” and eagerly they ran to Nellie. To Nellie to be patted, and caressed. To Nellie who fed them! What did they care about the woman who would strike them? Nellie was their friend and now they were hers! The woman, having let loose the dogs, ran on toward the house, some distance from the berry shed.
CHAPTER IV – ARBITRATION
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