Page:Greatest Short Stories (1915).djvu/284

Rh cause you are too close-fisted to clothe ’em decently or send ’em to school. Look at your house and yard. To see an Irishman’s shanty in such a condition seems appropriate enough, but a genteel place, a house with pillars, run down and gone to seed like that, is an eyesore to the community. Then look at your wife. You never would have had any property to mismanage if it hadn't been for her; and see the way you show your gratitude for it. You won’t let her go into company, nor have company at home; you won’t allow a hired girl in the house, but she and Maria have to do all the drudgery. You make perfect slaves of ’em. I swear, if it wa’n’t for your wife, I wouldn't work for you an hour longer; but she’s the best woman in the world, after all you’ve done to break her spirit, and I hate to leave her.’ “The old fellow squirmed, and wrenched the crowbar in the ground, then snarled back: ‘Yes! you’re waitin’ for me to die; then you mean to step into my shoes.’ “‘I hope you’ll have a decenter pair than them you've got on, if I'm to step into ’em,’ says I. “‘One thing about it,’ says he, ‘she won't have ye.’ “‘I should think,’ says I, ‘a woman that would marry you would have ’most anybody.’ “So we had it back and forth, till by and by he left me to throw off the rails, and went to show the boys how to build the fence.

“‘Look here,’ says he; ‘jest put a thunderin’ 281