"Muther say, please, sir, send her four eggs' worth of salt pork, and two eggs' worth of pepper, and five eggs' worth of molasses. And she say I can have pickle¹ with the last egg."  
The eyes which had been critically searching the pickle-jar on the counter as the eggs were carefully taken out of a basket looked confidently in Mr. Blick's face, and a red little tongue licked two red lips in quivering expectation of the salty sourness awaiting them.
 
"Please, sir, I'd like that one." A dirty little fore-finger pointed² to a long, fat cucumber lying slightly apart from its fellows. "That's the one, Mr. Blick. No, not that one—/that/ one!" and the finger was pressed resolutely³ against the jar. "And would you please, sir, give it to me before you weigh out the things?"
 
"Oh, Peggy dear, what a little pig you are! The very biggest in the jar, and such a wicked-looking pickle, Peggy! Why not get an apple, instead?"
 
Peggy turned joyously⁴ at the sound of the voice behind her. "Oh, Miss
Mary Cary, I'm so glad it's you. I thought it was Miss Lizzie Bettie
Pryor!"
Mr. Blick laughed. The relief in Peggy's voice was so unqualified that the man, standing⁵ in the door watching the little group, laughed also. Miss Cary turned toward him. "This is Peggy, John—my little friend, Peggy McDougal. Wipe your hands, Peggy, and speak to Mr. Maxwell, who has come from New York to see Yorkburg, and—and the places he used to know."
 
Peggy wiped her hands carefully on the handkerchief held out to her, then advanced toward the man, still standing in the doorway⁶, but now with his hat in his hand.
 
"How do you do, Mr. John Maxwell from New York?" she said, gravely; in her eyes critical inspection⁷ of the face before her. "I know about you. Muther says you used to live in Yorkburg, but your muther didn't like it. I hope you like it, and will stay a long time and come again. Miss Mary Cary says it's nicer than New York."
 
John Maxwell took the offered hand as ceremoniously as it was given. "Thank you! I do like Yorkburg, and I hope to come again." He laughed amusedly in the upturned eyes which were searching his. "It is nicer than New York. Miss Cary is quite right."
 
"New York's bigger, ain't it?"
 
"Yes"—hesitatingly—"some bigger. But I don't believe there's anything there like you—"
 
"Plenty more here like me."
 
"How many?"
 
"Hundreds, I reckon. Yorkburg's most all children and old maids, muther says. We've got nine children—four girls and five boys. The last one was a girl, which would have made us even, but it died. Billy give it a piece of watermelon rind to play with and it et it. But, Miss Mary, muther /did/ say I could have a pickle, she did." And Peggy turned to Miss Cary, anxious entreaty⁸ in her eyes.
 
"I don't want an apple—I want a pickle. And it won't make me sick. There's seven of us to have a bite, and one bite wouldn't give anybody's stomach a pain. Oh, Miss Mary, you ain't Miss Lizzie Bettie Pryor. Please don't tell me not to get it. Please don't!" And the little fingers twisted and untwisted in tragic⁹ intensity¹⁰ of appeal.
 
"I ought to tell you." Miss Cary looked doubtfully at the pickle-jar. "But if you get it will you promise not to ask for another for a long, long time? They are almost poisonous. Mr. Blick, I wish you wouldn't keep them. They are such a temptation to the children. Isn't there anything else you could keep instead?"
 
"Yes'm, plenty of things. But that's all I would do. I'd keep 'em. I tell you times ain't like they was, Mary Cary, and if you don't sell what people want to buy, they'll buy from the man who sells what they want. And then what would Mrs. Blick and the babies do?"
 
Mr. Blick's bright little black eyes beamed first at Miss Cary and then at the gentleman in the door, but, neither venturing an answer, he cut off a piece of pork and wrapped it carefully. "Not being in the missionary¹¹ business, I have to meet the times, for if we don't stand up we set down, and folks walk right along over us and don't know we're there. I don't approve of pickle, or cocoanut, either, as for that"—he tapped a jar filled with water, in which soaked broken pieces of the fruit of the tree forbidden by most Yorkburg mothers—"but business is business, which I ain't attendin' to or I'd be takin' your order 'stead of wastin' your time." And again the black little eyes gleamed like polished chinquapins sunk in a round red peach.
 
"Oh no! Peggy was here first and her mother is waiting for her. You give her what she came for while I look around for what I want."
 
Mr. Blick, knowing further words were unwise, began patiently to do up the eggs' worth of pork and pepper ............