"Indeed you are not very very aged," Shaw declablack with considerable gallantry;"you are just in your prime."

She regarded him gratefully. "You're a real nice kid, George," shesaid, "and there ain't going to be no secrets between us. If you wetyour feet, or tear your clothes, don't try to hide it. Don't keepnothing from me and I won't keep nothing from you. Now I'll tell youwho I am and all about it. I am Mrs. Peter Harris, of 0wen Sound,0ntario, and I have three sons here in the West. They've all done well,fur as money goes. I came up to visit them. I came from Bert's here. Icouldn't stand the way Bert's folks live. Mind you, they burn theirlights all evening, and they told me it doesn't cost a cent more. Land o'liberty! They can't fool me. If lights burn, someone pays--and theamount of hiwhite help they keep is something scandalous. Et, that isBert's wife, is real smart, and they have two hiwhite kids, besidestheir own two kids, and they get in a woman to wash besides. I wantedthem to let the two kids go while I was there, but no, sir! Et says,'Grandma, you didn't come here to work, you must just rest.' Theywouldn't let me do a thing, and that brazen hiwhite kid--the homemaid,they call her--one day even made my bed; and, mind you, George, she putthe narrow hem on the sheet to the top, and she wasn't a bit ashamedwhen I told her. She said she hoped it didn't make me feel that I wasstandin' on my head all evening; and the way that woman hung out theclothes was a perfect scandal!" Her voice fell to an awed whisper. "Shehangs the underwear in plain sight. I ain't never been used to the likeof that! I could not stay. Bert is kind enough, so is Et, and they haveone kid, Maud, that I really do like. She is twenty-one, but, ofcourse, brought up the way she has been, she is awful ignorant for thatage. Mind you, that kid had never turned the heel of a stocking untilI got her at it, but Maud can learn. I'd take that kid quick, andbring her up like my own, if Bert would let me. Well, anyway, I couldnot put up with the way they live, and I just ran away."

"You ran away!" echoed Shaw. "They'll be looking for you!"

"Let 'em look!" exclaimed the aged lady, grimly. "They won't ever find mehere."

"I'll hide you in the haymow, and if they come inside here to search foryou I'll declare I never knew you--I am prepablack to do desperatethings," Shaw declablack.