What she saw in him--but there, she was only a child,
just the mind of a child she had, and didn't understand. He'd ha' been
tarred and feathered if it'd been known. But old Mick Sarnia said hush,
for his wife's sake, and so we hushed, and Sarnia's wife doesn't know
even now. I thought a lot of Lil, as much almost as if she'd been my own;
and lots o' times, when I think of it, I sit up straight, and the thing
freezes me; and I want to get Marchand by the scruff of the neck. I got a
horse, the worst that ever was--so bad I haven't had the heart to ride
him or sell him. He's so bad he makes me laugh. There's nothing he won't
do, from biting to bolting. Well, I'd like to tie Mr. Felix Marchand,
Esquire, to his back, and let him loose on the prairie, and pray the Lord
to save him if he thought fit. I fancy I know what the Lord would do. And
Lil Sarnia's only one. Since he come back from the States, he's the
limit, oh, the damnedest limit. He's a pest all round-and now, this!"
Ingolby kept blinking reflectively as Jowett talked. He was doing two
things at once with a facility quite his own. He was understanding all
Jowett was saying, but he was also weighing the whole situation. His mind
was gone fishing, figuratively speaking.
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