A Little Question in Ladies' Rights. Fillmore Parker
ought to give me half, oughtn't you?"
"I dunno but what I ought."
A timid creature would have rested content with this, but Margery had had too many dealings with the other sex to put undue confidence in any concession so vaguely expressed, so grudgingly admitted. It was rather a hard thing to do – she knew beforehand Willie Jones would hate her for it – but a nickel is a nickel, and now or never, she realized, was the moment to demand a definite promise.
"Well, then, will you?"
Willie seemed not to hear.
"Will you?" Margery repeated, stopping her picking to make her question more emphatic.
Willie looked up apprehensively toward the gravedigger's house.
"If you don't stop arguing and go ahead picking we won't either of us have anything," he burst out querulously.
It was hard indeed not to act upon a suggestion so plainly expected to be of benefit to them both. Fortunately, Margery knew that if she had but character to persist a little longer she would probably gain her end. So, by a great effort of will, she continued idle and reiterated tiresomely:
"Well, will you?"
"Will I? Why, of course I will!" Willie raised his voice and screwed up his face into a tight little knot of impatience and disgust. "Haven't I been telling you that for half an hour? You are the dumbest ox sometimes! Why, do you suppose I'd ask you to help me if I hadn't expected to share with you? You must think I'm an awful tightwad!"
Margery bent her head humbly under this tirade. She had nothing more to say, no defense to utter. By her unwomanly persistence she had very clearly lost whatever admiration and respect Willie Jones might once have felt for her. But – but – but she was in for half the profits!.. Women are so prone nowadays to prefer some petty material gain to the grand old-fashioned whatchemaycallit.
"I think we're going to get our two full quarts," Margery remarked amiably. Of course she was amiable. She had every reason to be amiable.
Willie Jones, who by this time had fallen silent, made no comment.
"Don't you think so?" Margery pursued sweetly.
"Huh!" grunted Willie Jones.
When the tin pail was about full an accident happened to Margery. She stepped into something soft and clayey, and the next instant, seeing what it was, she started off by leaps and bounds, crying out the shrill warning: "Run, Willie, run! Bumble bees! I stepped on a bumble bee nest!"
A young gravedigger – if it be correct to call the offspring of an old gravedigger a young gravedigger – caught sight of the poachers just at this moment, and, shouting out, "Hey, there! You!" started toward them down the knoll. The incredible speed with which the poachers fled seemed to give the young gravedigger an erroneous idea of the fear that his presence inspired. There was small likelihood of his overtaking them before they reached the safety of the other side of the fence, but they seemed to him so little to realize this that, for the mere pleasure of pursuit, the young gravedigger pounded on, brandishing his arms and roaring his threats. By the time Margery and Willie made the fence they had so far outdistanced the bees that Willie had courage to face about and shout back defiance to all threats and to show his contempt for the whole race of gravediggers by pointing his thumb to his nose and wriggling his fingers in that same derisive and, it must be conceded, effective manner already mentioned. Although still at a considerable distance, the young gravedigger caught the full meaning of the insult and almost exploded with rage.
"You – you little – " he began. But he did not finish. They saw him stop suddenly, look up, and then, flinging his arms over his head, rush madly back the way he had just come.
"Oh! Oh! Oh!" Willie Jones shouted, hopping up and down in the intensity of his enjoyment. "Margery, do you see him? The bees are after him! Jiminy! Jiminy! Jiminy!"
Willie Jones lay down on the ground and rolled and kicked and plucked up handfuls of grass in an effort to work off the exuberance of his joy.
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