SHIANA
53
same basin, with the same milk in it, down before her husband. When he saw what she had done, he got up from the table in a rage and went out. As he was going out, she said, "Well, indeed, it is hard to please people! Milk with a mouse in it won't do, nor milk with a mouse out of it!"
Kate.—My hand to you, Kate Music! You never failed to make a blunder! What did her husband say, Abbie?
Abbie.—Why, what could the man say? That was just the way with Shiana. When he had no money he was not satisfied, and then when he had the purse, and leave to draw out of it, he was not satisfied either. He was as hard to please as Kate Music's husband.
Kate.—Why, see now, Abbie, you don't rightly understand the thing. When Shiana was getting the purse he didn't give himself time to consider the condition. Then when the bargain was made, and confirmed by the virtue of the Holy Things, he had leisure enough for reflection. The time was going at a gallop, and he had never got an answer to that question of his "Where shall we go then?" How cunningly the Black Man said to him: "Won't it be time enough for you to ask that question when we are starting?" He didn't understand it in time.
Abbie.—Indeed then, Kate, I am afraid that he understood it right well from the beginning, but he was so anxious for the purse that he didn't care. And I think the Black Man knew that he understood it when he said to him, "You are sharp-witted." It's my opinion that the pair understood each other right well.
