Page:A Girl of the Limberlost.djvu/266

248 strings. She unfastened and stepped from the skirt of her calico dress. With one apron string she tied shut the band and placket. She pulled a wire pin from her hair, stuck it through the other string, and using it as a bodkin ran it around the hem of her skirt. Her fingers flew; and shortly she had a large bag. She put several branches inside to which the moths could cling, closed the mouth partially and held it toward Pete. "Put your hand well down and let the things go!" she ordered. "But be careful, man! Don't run into the twigs! Easy! That's one. Now the other. Is the one on my head gone? There was one on my dress, but I guess it flew. Here comes a kind of a gray-looking one." Pete slipped several more moths into the bag. "Now, that's five, Mrs. Comstock," he said. "I'm sorry, but you'll have to make that do. You must get out of here lively. Your lights will be taken for hurry calls, and inside the next hour a couple of men will ride here like fury. They won't be nice Sunday school men, and they won't hold bags and catch moths for you. You must go quick!" Mrs. Comstock laid down the bag and pulled one of the lanterns lower. "I won't budge a step," she said. "This land don't belong to you. You have no right to order me off it. Here I stay until I get a Yellow Emperor, and no little petering thieves of this neighbourhood can scare me away." "You don't understand," said Pete. "I'm willing to help Elnora, and I'd take care of you if I could, but there