It took Pepsy a few moments to key herself up to the speaking point.
Then she spoke tremulously but with a kind of jerky readiness suggesting
many lonely rehearsals.
"Mr. Jensen," she said, "I have to do a good turn and so I came
to ask you if you'll help me and the reason I smell like kerosene is
because I tipped over the kerosene can." This last was not in her
studied part, but she threw it in answer to an audible sniff from
Mr. Jensen.
"You said when I came here and stayed nights when Mrs. Jensen
was sick with the flu and everybody else was sick and you couldn't
get anybody to do--to nurse her--you remember?" She did not give him
time to answer for she knew that if she paused she could not go on.
Her momentum kept her going. "You said then--just before I went
home--you'd--you said I was--you said you'd do me a good turn some
day, because I helped you. So now a boy that's staying with us--we
have a refreshment parlor and nobody comes to buy anything--and he
wants to buy some tents and we have to make a lot of money so will
you please have them have the County Fair in Berryville this year so
lots of people will go past our summerhouse?
"We have lemonade and he calls to the people and tells them, only
there ain't any people.
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