The pore I be in! Why, Miss Ruby, you'm streamin'-leakin'!" "I'm wet through, Mary Jane; an' I don't care if I die." Ruby sank on the settle, and fairly broke down.
"Hush 'ee now, co!" "I don't, I don't, an' I don't! I'm tired o' the world, an' my heart's broke.

Mary Jane, you selfish thing, you've never asked about my banns, no more'n the rest; an' after that cast-off frock, too, that I gave you last week so good as new!" "Was it very grand, Miss Ruby?
Was it shuddery an' yet joyful-- lily-white an' yet rosy-red--hot an' yet cold--'don't lift me so high,' an' yet 'praise God, I'm exalted above women' ?" "'Twas all and yet none.

'Twas a voice speakin' my name, sweet an' terrible, an' I longed for it to go on an' on; and then came the Gauger stunnin' and shoutin' 'Wreck! wreck!' like a trumpet, an' the church was full o' wind, an' the folk ran this way an' that, like sheep, an' left me sittin' there.

I'll--I'll die an old maid, I will, if only to s--spite such ma--ma--manners!" "Aw, pore dear! But there's better tricks than dyin' unwed.

Bind up my finger, Miss Ruby, an' listen.