Part 20 (1/2)
”Well!” piped Ellen, after waiting a moment.
”Well, what?” Lucy asked.
”Ain't you got no interest in what I'm goin' for?” the woman demanded querulously.
”I'm always interested in anything you wish to tell me,” answered the girl, ”but I thought it was not my place to inquire into your business.”
”It is my business, an' I can keep it to myself,” said Ellen tartly. ”But I'll tell you this much--I'm goin' to get my will made.”
The hard blue eyes fixed themselves on Lucy's face narrowly.
”My will!” repeated Ellen, a challenge in her tone. ”I s'pose you thought it was all made long ago; but it warn't. I'm goin' to make it to-day.”
At a loss how to reply, Lucy nodded.
”You don't seem much concerned 'bout it,” observed her aunt peevishly.
”Ain't you curious to know who I'm goin' to leave my property to?”
”No.”
”You ain't!”
”No.”
”S'pose I was to give it all to you.”
”That would be very kind.”
”Yes, it would be--it would be kind,” agreed Ellen. ”But mebbe I ain't a-goin' to. Mebbe I'm goin' to will it to somebody else.”
”That's your affair.”
”I'll bet, for all your indifference, you'd be mad as a wet hen if I was to leave it to somebody else,” went on the woman provokingly.
”No, I shouldn't. Why should I?”
”'Cause you're my next of kin. By rights it had oughter come to you, hadn't it?”
”I don't know the New Hamps.h.i.+re laws.”
With an admiring glance at her niece, Ellen broke into an unpleasant laugh.
”There's no trappin' you, Miss Lucy Webster, is there?” she exclaimed, rising from her chair and clapping on her hat. ”You're a cute one, an awful cute one!”
”Why?”
”Oh, you don't need to be told,” chuckled Ellen. ”Anybody as cute as you are, _knows._”
With that she was gone.
All the morning the girl busied herself within doors, exchanging one duty for another. Toward noon, however, she made an excursion to the garden for lettuce and radishes. Her pathway lay close to the wall, and on her return to the house she was amazed to see lying on the topmost stone of the ruined heap a mammoth bunch of sweet peas. There was no mistaking the fact that the flowers were intended for her, for her name had been hastily scrawled on a bit of crumpled paper and placed beside them. Nothing could have surprised her more than to stumble upon this offering.