Page:George Weston--The apple-tree girl.djvu/18

 the kitchen holding her hands behind her. She watched Ma'm Bazin for a time in her old-fashioned way and then, holding out her hands, she said: "Look! Why do they call these Micah's apples?"

She had in her hand two apples. They were of a pale—I had almost said a sad—color; but here and there on the skin were small, raised spots of the shape and color of red currants.

"Hush!" cautioned Ma'm Bazin. She tiptoed to the hall door, enormously fat but full of sentiment, and then she made sure that no one was in the yard. As I have said, Charlotte was six years old, and you can imagine how she was impressed by these maneuvers.

"Nearly two hundred years ago," began Ma'm Bazin, "on this very farm, lived a farmer named Sowers and his four sons. They were lazy fellows, who do nothing but sit around and complain that a honest man he cannot prosper