But old Judd Tolliver
insisted that he should stay to dinner, and Dave tied the horses
to the fence and walked to the porch, not lifting his eyes to
June. Straightway the girl went into the house co help her step-
mother with dinner, but the old woman told her she "reckoned she
needn't start in yit"--adding in the querulous tone June knew so
well:
"I've been mighty po'ly, an' thar'll be a mighty lot fer you to do
now." So with this direful prophecy in her ears the girl
hesitated. The old woman looked at her closely.
"Ye ain't a bit changed," she said.
They were the words Loretta had used, and in the voice of each was
the same strange tone of disappointment. June wondered: were they
sorry she had not come back putting on airs and fussed up with
ribbons and feathers that they might hear her picked to pieces and
perhaps do some of the picking themselves? Not Loretta, surely--
but the old step-mother! June left the kitchen and sat down just
inside the door. The Red Fox and two other men had sauntered up
from the store and all were listening to his quavering chat:
"I seed a vision last night, and thar's trouble a-comin' in these
mountains.
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