Mrs. Lathrop furtively rubbed her eyes.

"Oh, yes, yes—I—" she began.

"Well, he wanted as I should come right over an' tell you to-night. An' I told him 't I would."

"Tell me wh—"

"I shall break it to you as easy as I can, Mrs. Lathrop; but there 's no denyin' as it 'll come very sharp on you at the end."

Mrs. Lathrop ceased to rub her eyes, and a vague apprehension opened them effectually instead.

"I presume, if you saw him at all, you saw how long he stayed?"

"Yes, I—"

"All of two hours, an' his talk was as dumfounderin' on me as it will be on you. I 'd never thought o' any such doin's in this direction. I always looked on as a complete outsider, did n't you?"

"I don't un—"

Susan had shed her jacket and cap while talking; she now took a chair and surveyed her friend with the air of one who has pain to inflict and yet is firm.

Mrs. Lathrop looked frankly troubled.

"Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you 'd ought to know me well enough, after all these years, to know as I shall make this as easy as I can for you. Perhaps the best way 'll be to go 'way back to the beginnin' an' speak o' when Mrs. White died. It'll be a proper leadin' up, for if she had n't died, he 'd never 'a' come to see me this afternoon, an' I 'd never 'a' come to see you to-night. Howsumsever, she did die; an', bein' dead, I will say for her husband as you don't find chick or child in town to deny as a nicer, tidier, more biddable little man never lived; 'n' 's far as my personal feelin's go, I should think 't any woman might consider it nothin' but a joy to get a man 's is always so long on the door-mat 'n' so busy with his tie 's the deacon is. He got some wore out toward the last o' her illness, for she was give' up in September 'n' died in July; but even then I 've heard Mrs. Allen say 's it was jus' pretty to see him putterin' aroun' busy 's a bee, tryin' to keep dusted up for the funeral any minute." Susan paused to sigh.

"Seems like she did n't 

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