“‘Good riddance!’ says Dinah.  ‘I’m right down tired o’ bein’ lectured,’ says she.  ‘Now I can roll over in the buttercups an’ sing, an’ be happy an’ do jest as I please.’

“So Dinah threw herself down in the long grass and, bing! she fell right atop of a wasp, and he was so scared at such capers he stung her in the cheek.  Whew!  You could hear her ’way ’cross the cotton field!

“Her ole gran’mam comforted her, the good soul.  ‘Never you mind, honey,’ she says, ‘I’ll swaje it fer you.’

“But every day Dinah got mo’ triflin’.  She pintedly wouldn’t wash the dishes, nor mind little Mose; an’ every time the hot fire o’ temper ran over her, she could hear a voice in her ear—­’Give it to ’em good.  That’s the way to do it, Dinah!’ An’ it kep’ gittin’ easier to be selfish an’ to let her temper run away, an’ the cabin got to be a mighty pore place jest on account o’ Dinah, who’d ought to ha’ been its sunshine.

“As for the fairy, Love, Dinah never heerd her voice, an’ she never called to her, though there was never a minute when she didn’t hate the sound o’ that other voice that had come to be in her ears more ’n half the time.

“One mornin’ everything went wrong with Dinah.  Her gran’mam was plum mis’able over her shif’less ways, an’ she set her to sew a seam befo’ she could step outside the do’.  The needle was dull, the thread fell in knots.  Dinah’s brow was mo’ knotted up than the thread.  Her head felt hot.

“‘Say you won’t do it,’ hissed the voice.

“‘I’ll git thrashed if I do.  Gran’mam said so.’

“‘What do you care!’ hissed the voice; and jest as the fairy Slap-back was talkin’ like this, up comes little Mose to Dinah, an’ laughs an’ pulls her work away.

“Then somethin’ awful happened.  Dinah couldn’t ‘a’ done it two weeks back; but it’s the way with them that listens to that mis’able, low-lifed Slap-back.  Jest as quick as a wink, that big gal, goin’ on nine, slapped baby Mose.  He was that took back for a minute that he didn’t cry; but the hateful voice laughed an’ hissed an’ laughed again.

“Good, Dinah, good!  Now you’ll ketch it!’

“Then over went little Mose’s lip, an’ he wailed out, an’ Dinah clasped her naughty hands an’ saw a face close to her—­a bad one, with red eyes shinin’.  She jumped away from it, for it made her cold to think she’d been havin’ sech a playfeller all along.

“‘Oh, Love, y’ ain’t done fergit me, is yer?  Come back, Love, Love!’ she called; then she dropped on her knees side o’ Mose an’ called him her honey an’ her lamb, an’ she cried with him, an’ pulled him into her lap, an’ when the ole gran’mam come in from where she’d been feedin’ the hens, they was both asleep.”

Franz took a long breath, for the way the apple woman told a story always made him listen hard.  “I guess that was the last of old Slap-back with Dinah,” he remarked.