The Revellers

"An' what affair is it of yours, Mr. Pickerin', who the boy belongs to? If all tales be true, you can't afford to throw stones at other folks's glass houses!"

Mrs. Bolland, stout, hooded, aproned, and fiery red in face, had come from the dairy, and now took a hand in the argument.

Pickering, annoyed at the unlooked-for presence of a woman, said sternly:

"Talk to your husband, not to me, ma'am. He wronged me by getting three times the value for a useless beast, and if you can convince him that he took an unfair advantage, I'm willing, even now----"

But Mrs. Bolland had caught the flicker of amazement in Martin's eye and was not to be mollified.

"Who are you, I'd like to know?" she shrilled, "coomin' te one's house an' scandalizin' us? A nice thing, to be sure, for a man like you to call John Bolland a wrongdoer. The cow won't calve, won't she? 'Tis a dispensation on you, George Pickerin'. You're payin' for yer own misdeeds. Ther