"I'll give you
your needings." She followed me to the house.
On the west porch, when she had exchanged the laced boots, khaki riding
breeches, and army shirt for a most absurdly feminine house gown, we had
tea. Her nose was powdered, and her slippers were bronzed leather and
monstrous small. She mingled Scotch whiskey with the tea and drank her
first cupful from a capacious saucer.
"That fresh bunch of campers!" she began. "What you reckon they did last
night? Cut my wire fence in two places over on the west flat--yes,
sir!--had a pair of wire clippers in the whip socket. What I didn't give
'em! Say, ain't it a downright wonder I still retain my girlish
laughter?"
But then, after she had refused my made cigarette for one of her own
deft handiwork, she spoke as I wished her to:
"Yes; three years ago. Me visiting a week at the home of Mrs. W.B.
Hemingway and her husband, just outside of Yonkers, back in York State.
A very nice swell home, with a nice front yard and everything. And also
Mrs. W.B.'s sister and her little boy, visiting her from Albany, the
sister's name being Mrs. L.H. Cummins, and the boy being nine years old
and named Rupert Cummins, Junior; and very junior he was for his age,
too--I will say that.
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