"You ought to see the picture postcards I got and the bon bon boxes, and the dance programs with silk tassels." (How she wished she _did_ have these lovely, unattainable things!) "I bet I could teach you how to do the Castle Walk." "Not me," said Gus. "No you don't." He cast an apprehensive glance at the girl and all but let a tureen slip out of his hands. "You bust that tureen and I'll run you out of the kitchen with a broom," said Early Ann. "My, my!" said Gus. "You're a wild woman, ain't you?" "You bet I'm wild." She tossed her shining curls in the lamp light and added a kettle to the gleaming row of copper vessels hanging along the wall. "I used to bite like everything when I was a little girl." "Let's see your teeth," said the hired man. She flashed her white teeth, then opened wide her pretty mouth. "Yep, you're a biter," Gus said. "But you ain't a day over seventeen by the looks of your molars." "You don't know anything about girls," said Early Ann. "All you know about is horses." From the other room came the voice of Sarah reading to Stanley by lamp light. Her voice was sweet, but particularly colorless this evening. "Where'd you come from anyway?" Gus wanted to know. "And who are your folks? There ain't no Shermans in Brailsford Junction." "None of your beeswax," the girl said firmly. "It's none of your beeswax where I came from." "Not that I care," said Gus. "Not that I'm curious. Ishkabibble! I should worry." "Oh, no. You ain't curious. You just got your tongue hanging out and your eyes popping, that's all. You're just running around like a couple of strange new dogs. You ain't curious." "It ain't nice for a girl to talk the way you talk," said Gus. "It ain't proper for a girl to talk about dogs like that." "I wasn't talking about dogs, I was talking about you," Early Ann said. "Don't you ever want to be a lady, Early Ann? Don't you ever want to ride in a hansom cab or a limousine, with ostrich plumes in your hat, and a parasol? Don't you ever want to learn how to be sweet and talk nice like Sarah Brailsford?" "She's lovely," said Early Ann with a sigh. "I sure wish I could be like Mrs. Brailsford. But I got a tongue like a little snake. I can't help what my tongue says.... Sure I want to be a lady and ride in a limousine. I want to be as graceful as Irene Castle, and dance like an angel, and have a house with swell brass beds and fumed oak mission furniture like you see in the Hartman catalogue, and a big cut-glass dish for the center of my table, and real lace curtains, and a new Ford with a Disco self-starter and...." "Gee whiz, you must be figurin' on marrying a millionaire," Gus said. "I want things," the girl said. "All I've had all my life is work, work, work."