Читать книгу The Valley of Squinting Windows онлайн

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When John came into the room she looked so pale that he fancied she must be ill. He inquired as to the causes of her condition, but she only replied that she would try to tell him when he had taken his breakfast.

As he was eating in silence she wondered what at all she could say to him or how she would attempt to place her view of things before him. This incident of the morning might be taken as a direct foreshadowing of what might happen if his foolish charity extended further down the valley. She did not dare to imagine what things he might be told or what stories might be suggested to his mind by the talk of the neighbors. But it was clearly her duty doubly to protect him from such a possibility. She saw that he had finished his breakfast.

"That was the quare thing you were doing just now, John? It was the quarest thing at all, so it was."

"Queer, mother; what was?"

"Talking to old Marse Prendergast, son, and she only a woman of the roads with a bad tongue on her."

"I only stopped talking with her, mother, so that I might carry her sticks. She was not able."