A VISITOR FROM HOME
"Whaih do you live? I'm comin' roun' to see 'em."
He hesitated for a moment. He knew how his mother, if not Kit, would receive her, and yet he dared not anger this woman, who had his fate in the hollow of-her hand.
She saw his hesitation and spoke up. "Oh, that's all right. Let by-gones be by-gones, You know I ain't the kin' o' person that holds a grudge ag'in anybody."
"That's right, Minty, that's right," he said, and gave her his mother's address. Then he hastened home to prepare the way for Minty's coming. Joe had no doubt but that his mother would see the matter quite as he saw it, and be willing to temporise with Minty; but he had reckoned without his host. Mrs. Hamilton might make certain concessions to strangers on the score of expediency, but she absolutely refused to yield one iota of her dignity to one whom she had known so long as an inferior.
135
