"Ye--yes," hesitated Johnnie; "but you mustn't get the idea that I don't
love my work--because I do. You see the children haven't had any
schooling yet, and--well, I'm a great, big, stout somebody, and it looks
like I'm the one to work in the mill."
She turned to him fleetingly a countenance of appeal and perplexity. It
seemed indeed anything but certain that she was one to work in the mill.
There was something almost grotesque in the idea which made Stoddard
smile a little at her earnestness.
"I'd like to talk it over with you when you've been at work there
longer," he found himself saying. "You see, I'm studying mill conditions
from one side, and you're studying them from the opposite--perhaps we
could help each other."
"I sure will tell you what I find out," agreed Johnnie heartily. "I
reckon you'll want to know how the work seems to me at the side of such
as I was used to in the mountains; but I hope you won't inquire how long
it took me to learn, for I'm afraid I'm going to make a poor record. If
you was to ask me how much I was able to earn there, and how much back
on Unaka, I could make a good report for the mill on that, because
that's all that's the matter with the mountains--they're a beautiful
place to live, but a body can't hardly earn a cent, work as they may."
Johnnie forgot herself--she was always doing that--and she talked freely
and well.
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