"No, gal, we can't understand how anybody as good and loving as you
have been to us can be at heart as bad as--as other folks might try
to make out. Fact is, we know you can't be bad."
"What--what do you mean, Cap'n Ball?" she asked faintly.
"I swan! I tell ye what I'm getting at," burst out the old man. "We
want you to come back. Prudence, she wants you to come back. I swan!
I want you to come back. Why, even that dratted Queen of Sheby needs
you, Ida May--or, whatever your name is! We've got to have you!"
"Prudence can't scurcely get around the house. And that niece of
hers sits there like a stick or a stun, not willin' to scurce lift
her hand to help. Thank the Lord _she's_ goin' home to-day. Her
visit's come to an end. She don't like it down here. She says we're
all a set of--er--hicks, I believe she calls us.
"Howsomever, we're all high and dry on the reefs, gal, and it seems
likely you're the only one can get us off. You ain't got to go away
from here, if you don't want to. I've made it pretty average plain
to that Bostwick gal that no matter what happens, she's got no
expectations as far as Prudence and me are concerned. It was money
and nothing but money she was after.
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