Page:Under the Tonto Rim - 1926.djvu/22

 cally. “If only the Denmeades an’ the rest of them will have it.”

“Will they be too proud or—or anything to give me a chance?” asked Lucy, anxiously.

“We're all plain folks up here, an’ the backwoods families keep to themselves,” she replied. “I don’t know as I'd call them proud. They're ignorant enough, Lord knows. But they’re just backwoods. Like ground-hogs, they stay in their holes.”

On the moment the woman’s husband came in from the street. He appeared to be a gaunt man, pallid, and evidently suffered from a lung complaint, for he had a hoarse cough.

“Bill, come here,” called his wife. “Miss Watson has what I think a wonderful mission. If it will only work! ... She’s been hired by the state government to go among our people up here in the backwoods an’ teach them things. She has explained to me a lot of things she will do. But in few words it means better homes for those poor people. What do you think about it?”

“Wal, first off I'd say she is a plucky an’ fine little girl to take such a job,” replied Mr. Lynn. “Then I'd say it’s good of the state. But when it comes to what the Denmeades an’ the Claypools will think about it I’'m up a stump.”

“Bill, it’s such a splendid idea,” said his wife, earnestly. “She can do much for the mothers an’ children up there. We must help her to get a start.”

“I reckon. Now let’s see,” returned her husband, ponderingly. “If our backwoods neighbors are only approached right they’re fine an’ hospitable. The women would welcome anyone who could help them. But the men ain’t so easy. Miss Watson, though, bein’ young an’ nice-lookin’, may be able to make a go of it.... If she can keep Edd Denmeade or one of them bee hunters from marryin’ her!”

Here Lynn laughed good-humoredly and smiled knowingly at Lucy. Mrs. Lynn took the question more seriously.

“I was goin’ to tell her that myself,” she said. “But we mustn’t give her the wrong impression about our neighbors.