Page:The plumed serpent - 1926.djvu/49

“Don't want any,” he snapped, turning his face away as if he had been offered a plate of Mexicans, and leaving Kate with the dish suspended.

Mrs Norris quickly but definitely took the plate, saying:

“Judge Burlap is afraid of Sesame Seed, he prefers the cave shut.” And she handed the dish quietly to Cipriano, who was watching the old man's bad manners with black, snake-like eyes.

“Did you see that article by Willis Rice Hope, in the Excelsior?” suddenly snarled the Judge, to his hostess.

“I did. I thought it very sensible.”

“The only sensible thing that's been said about these Agrarian Laws. Sensible! I should think so. Why Rice Hope came to me, and I put him up to a few things. But his article says everything, doesn't miss an item of importance.”

“Quite!” said Mrs Norris, with rather stony attention. “If only saying would alter things, Judge Burlap.”

“Saying the wrong thing has Jone all the mischief!” snapped the Judge. “Fellows like Garfield Spence coming down here and talking a lot of criminal talk. Why the town's full of Socialists Sinvergüenzas from New York.”

Mrs Norris adjusted her pince-nez.

“Fortunately,” she said, “they don't come out to Tlacolula, so we needn't about them. Mrs Henry, let me give you some more tea.”

“Do you read Spanish?” the Judge spat out, at Owen, in his big shell spectacles, was evidently a rag to his irritable fellow-countryman.

“No!” said Owen, round as a cannon-shot.

Mrs Norris once more adjusted her eye-glasses.

“It's such a relief to hear someone who is altogether innocent of Spanish, and altogether unashamed,” she said. “My father had us all speaking four languages by the time we were twelve, and we have none of us ever quite recovered. My stockings were all dyed blue for me before I put my hair up. By the way! How have you been for walking, Judge? You heard of the time I had with my ankle?”

“Of course we heard!” cried Mrs Burlap, seeing dry land at last. “I've been trying so hard to get out to see you, to ask about it. We were so grieved about it.”

“What happened?” said Kate.