Other Peoples Business | Page 7

Trotter, a greedy look coming into her eyes.
"Mis' Trotter, I always send back the pieces, even if they're no bigger
than a handkerchief. If anybody's going to make carpet rags out of the
scraps, I don't know why it shouldn't be the people who bought and
paid for the goods."
"And that's where you're right," Mrs. Trotter agreed, with the
adaptability that was one of her strong points. "There was Mattie
Kendall, now, who kept up her dressmaking after she married Henry

Beach. Well, she set out to dress her children on the left-overs, and it
went all right while they was little. But Mamie got grasping. After her
oldest girl was as long-legged as a colt, she'd send word to her
customers and say that they needed another yard and a half or two
yards to make their dresses in any kind of style. Of course it got out in
time, and everybody who wanted sewing done went to a woman in
South Rivers. I often say to Bartholomew that honesty's the best policy,
even where it looks the other way round."
During the progress of this moral tale, Persis' thoughts had been
self-accusing. She reflected that curiosity is not among the seven
deadly sins, and that if Mrs. Trotter found in listening at key-holes any
compensation for the undeniable hardships of her lot, only a harsh
nature would grudge her such solace. Moreover ingrained in Persis'
disposition, was the inability to hold a grudge against one who asked
her a favor.
"I don't know, Mis' Trotter, but maybe I've got some white pieces of
my own that aren't big enough for anything but baby clothes. I'll look
over my piece-bag to-morrow. If there's anything you can use, you'll be
welcome."
Mrs. Trotter expressed her appreciation, "With all the sewing I done
when Benny was expected, I did think I was pretty well fixed, come
what might. I didn't reckon on the twins, you see. And then when little
Tom died, they laid him out in the embroidered dress I'd counted on for
the christening of the lot. Not that I grudged it to him," added the
mother quickly, and sighed.
This had the effect of dissipating Persis' sense of annoyance. "I'm pretty
sure I can find you something, Mis' Trotter. And I'll speak to one or
two of my customers. Some of 'em may have things put away that
they're not likely to want again."
Mrs. Trotter received the offer with a dignity untainted by servile
gratitude.
"Me and Bartholomew feel that in raising up a family the size of ourn,

we're doing the community a service. So we ain't afraid to take a little
help when we happen to need it. And by the way, if you should find
some of the white pieces you was talking about, maybe you wouldn't
mind cutting out the little slips and just stitching 'em up on your
machine. The needle of mine's been broke this six months, and anyway,
something's the matter with the wheels. They won't hardly turn."
"Need oil, probably," commented Persis. She knew she was wasting her
breath in making the suggestion. The shiftlessness which left the
sewing-machine useless junk in a family of eight was a Trotter
characteristic. If Bartholomew could have appreciated the value of
machine oil, he would have been an entirely different man, and
probably able to support his family. In view of this, Persis felt that she
could do no less than add: "To be sure I'll stitch 'em up. 'Twon't take
much of any time."
"Now I'm not going to keep you a minute longer. I guess Thomas
Hardin don't come here to talk to your brother the whole evening." Mrs.
Trotter smiled pleasantly, but with a distinct tinge of patronage, the
inevitable superiority of the wedded wife to the woman who has carried
her maiden name well through the thirties. And indeed in Mrs. Trotter's
estimation, the hardships of her matrimonial experience were trivial in
comparison with the unspeakable calamity of being an old maid.
After Joel was once fairly launched on the subject of hygiene, it was
difficult, as a rule, to introduce another topic of conversation under an
hour and a quarter. Persis was almost startled, on her return, to find the
two men discussing an alien theme. More surprising still, instead of
sulking over the curtailment of the dear privilege of self-dissection,
Joel was plainly interested.
"It's one of the games where you can't lose, if you take their word for
it," Thomas was explaining to his absorbed listener. "The company
begins to pay you int'rest on your investment just as soon as you hand
over the money, six per cent. every year up to the time the orchard gets
to bearing. Then it goes up little by