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Page 27
"'No, she ain't,' says I, pretty short.
"'I thought I didn't smell the coffee,' says Luella.
"'Coffee,' says I. 'I guess if you have coffee this mornin' you'll
make it yourself.'
"'I never made the coffee in all my life,' says she, dreadful
astonished. 'Erastus always made the coffee as long as he lived,
and then Lily she made it, and then Aunt Abby made it. I don't
believe I CAN make the coffee, Miss Anderson.'
"'You can make it or go without, jest as you please,' says I.
"'Ain't Aunt Abby goin' to get up?' says she.
"'I guess she won't get up,' says I, 'sick as she is.' I was
gettin' madder and madder. There was somethin' about that little
pink-and-white thing standin' there and talkin' about coffee, when
she had killed so many better folks than she was, and had jest
killed another, that made me feel 'most as if I wished somebody
would up and kill her before she had a chance to do any more harm.
"'Is Aunt Abby sick?' says Luella, as if she was sort of aggrieved
and injured.
"'Yes,' says I, 'she's sick, and she's goin' to die, and then
you'll be left alone, and you'll have to do for yourself and wait
on yourself, or do without things.' I don't know but I was sort of
hard, but it was the truth, and if I was any harder than Luella
Miller had been I'll give up. I ain't never been sorry that I said
it. Well, Luella, she up and had hysterics again at that, and I
jest let her have 'em. All I did was to bundle her into the room
on the other side of the entry where Aunt Abby couldn't hear her,
if she wa'n't past it--I don't know but she was--and set her down
hard in a chair and told her not to come back into the other room,
and she minded. She had her hysterics in there till she got tired.
When she found out that nobody was comin' to coddle her and do for
her she stopped. At least I suppose she did. I had all I could do
with poor Aunt Abby tryin' to keep the breath of life in her. The
doctor had told me that she was dreadful low, and give me some very
strong medicine to give to her in drops real often, and told me
real particular about the nourishment. Well, I did as he told me
real faithful till she wa'n't able to swaller any longer. Then I
had her daughter sent for. I had begun to realize that she
wouldn't last any time at all. I hadn't realized it before, though
I spoke to Luella the way I did. The doctor he came, and Mrs. Sam
Abbot, but when she got there it was too late; her mother was dead.
Aunt Abby's daughter just give one look at her mother layin' there,
then she turned sort of sharp and sudden and looked at me.
"'Where is she?' says she, and I knew she meant Luella.
"'She's out in the kitchen,' says I. 'She's too nervous to see
folks die. She's afraid it will make her sick.'
"The Doctor he speaks up then. He was a young man. Old Doctor
Park had died the year before, and this was a young fellow just out
of college. 'Mrs. Miller is not strong,' says he, kind of severe,
'and she is quite right in not agitating herself.'
"'You are another, young man; she's got her pretty claw on you,'
thinks I, but I didn't say anythin' to him. I just said over to
Mrs. Sam Abbot that Luella was in the kitchen, and Mrs. Sam Abbot
she went out there, and I went, too, and I never heard anythin'
like the way she talked to Luella Miller. I felt pretty hard to
Luella myself, but this was more than I ever would have dared to
say. Luella she was too scared to go into hysterics. She jest
flopped. She seemed to jest shrink away to nothin' in that kitchen
chair, with Mrs. Sam Abbot standin' over her and talkin' and
tellin' her the truth. I guess the truth was most too much for her
and no mistake, because Luella presently actually did faint away,
and there wa'n't any sham about it, the way I always suspected
there was about them hysterics. She fainted dead away and we had
to lay her flat on the floor, and the Doctor he came runnin' out
and he said somethin' about a weak heart dreadful fierce to Mrs.
Sam Abbot, but she wa'n't a mite scared. She faced him jest as
white as even Luella was layin' there lookin' like death and the
Doctor feelin' of her pulse.
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