"I do not think about it," said Rotha with spirit. "I have nothing to do with it. My aunt sent me here. If you cannot keep me, or do not wish to keep me, that is your affair. I will go back again." "What did you come for?" "I told you; my aunt was leaving home." "Joe says, there's fish in the brook that'll jump at a fly made o' muslin--but I aint that sort o' fish. I didn't engage to make no bread for Mis' Busby when I come here." "Shall I write to my aunt, then, that it is not convenient for me to stay here." "You can if you like, for it _aint_ convenient; but it's no use; for Mr. Purcell don't care, and Mis' Busby don't care. I'll make all the bread you'll eat; I guess." "What do Mrs. Busby and Mr. Purcell not care about?" "They don't care whether I make bread all day, or not." "I hope it will not be for long," said Rotha, "that I shall give you this trouble." "I don't know how long it will be," said Mrs. Purcell, making out her loaves with quick dexterity and putting them in the pans which stood ready; "but I aint a fool. I can tell you one thing. Mis' Busby aint a fool neither; and when she pays anybody to go from New York here in the cars, it aint to pick her a bunch o' flowers and go back again." Rotha was not a fool either, and was of the same opinion. This brought her back to her business. "If I stay a while, I shall want to get at some books to read," she said. "Are there any in the house?" "Books?" said Mrs. Purcell. "I've never seen no books since I've been here." "Where can I get some, then? Where are there any?" "I don't know nothin' about books. I don't have no use for no books, my own self. I don't read none--'cept my 'little blue John.'" "Your 'little blue John'? What is that?" "I s'pose you have a big one." "I do not know what you mean." "I don't mean nothin'," said the woman impatiently. "There's my 'little blue John'--up on the mantel shelf; you can look at it if you want to." Looking to the high shelf above the kitchen fireplace, Rotha saw a little book lying there. Taking it down, she was greatly astonished to find it a copy of the gospel of John, a little square copy, in limp covers, very much read. More surprised Rotha could hardly have been. "Why, do you like this?" she involuntarily exclaimed. "Sometimes I think I do,"--was Mrs. Purcell's ambiguous, or ironical, answer; as she carefully spread neat cloths over her pans of bread. Rotha wondered at the woman. She was handsome, she had a good figure and presence; but there was a curious mixture of defiance and recklessness in her expression and manner. "I see you have read it a good deal." "It's easy readin',"--was the short answer. "Do you like the gospel of John so much better than all the rest of the Bible?" "I don' know. The rest has too many words I can't make out." "Well, I am very fond of the gospel of John too," said Rotha. "I think everybody is,--that loves Christ."