Page:Morley roberts--Painted Rock.djvu/286

 "Five or ten won't alter me," said Mis' Higginson. "I'd ruther see water than blood any day."

"You mean it, Mary?" asked Old Bill.

"I does, Bill. Your tantrums fatigue me awful," said Mis' Higginson.

There was a long pause.

"Waal, I won't kill no one, at least not to-day," said Bill. He got off the pinto. He stroked the ancient animal's nose.

"After all, I'd ruther it was you, Billy Prentiss, than Morgan Harris or Joyce Briggs," he said. "I always was down on Joyce Briggs."

That night Amandy told her husband that she, too, had always been down on poor Joyce Briggs.