That Girl of Johnson's — page 25: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

ad _.. THAT GIRL OF JOHNSON’S. ’ QGurse ye! Yer mother was fool ’nough, but ye’re worse. No wonder thar ain’t one but says ye air a fool, ’thout even ther sense o’ most.” She rose up slowly to her full height and confronted — him. There was a dull flush on her cheeks and a flash in her eyes, and he shrank from her. Her soul was in her eyes and his shrank from it. ‘“‘Father, say what you like of me; you shall say nothing of my mother; she is beyond your power now.” He changed the subject. The book had slipped from his hand and fallen to the ground; he kicked it contemptuous- ly. The flash deepened in her eyes, but she had had her say, and sat down. The moonlight was on her face and hair; her shadow lay long and dark behind her. ‘“Theys telled me et ther tav’n thet ye was up ter thes; they says ye were too high an ’mighty fer a common smith’s darter; thet ye thought yer dad beneath yer; thet - ye never talks to ’em fer fear theys kyant understan’ ye. Theys ’lowed thet Betsy Glenn teached ye to read an’ write when ye were little. She was a schoolma’am once ower in Scruptown, an’ thought consid’rable o’ ther learnin’, Schoolma’ams is all fools——” Her eyes were on him, and he stopped. Her mother had been a school-teacher; she loved her books—some people said that she loved her books more than she did her hus- band, and that he was jealous of them and had forbidden her touching them. | Lavina Ketcham made a gentle wife; she gave up much for peace, and at first she had loved her husband; after- ward she found out his brute nature. Her nature was fine, and she was true to him always, but love was out of the question then, He forbade her the use of her books, and in that only she would not obey him. For a nature like hers to die mentally or even to stagnate was impossible. She was above him as the stars she loved were above her, and she knew it, and he knew it also; he hated her for it. ' She was a school-teacher, and as school-teachers did not > comicbooks co