ence; a gentle voice; the voice of a man who would dream dreams
but perform few actions.

"Um!... It's you, hey? What d'you allus carry books under your arm for?
How d'you calculate to be able to open doors, with both hands full?"

The knob turned at last, and Nahum Pound, long schoolmaster in the
little district school on Hiper Hill, came in hesitatingly, clutching
with each arm half a dozen books which struggled to escape with the
ingenuity of inanimate objects. Nahum's hair was white; his face was
vague--lovably vague.... A man of considerable, if confused, learning,
he was.

"Well?" said Scattergood. "Got suthin' on to your mind? Commence
unloadin' it before it busts your back."

"It's Sarah," said Nahum, helplessly.

"Um!... Sairy, eh? What's Sairy up to?"

"I don't seem to gather, Mr. Baines. She's--she's difficult. Something
seems to be working in her head."

"Twenty-two, hain't she? Twenty-two?... Prob'ly a number of things
a-workin' in her head. Got any special symptoms?"

"She--she wants to leave home, Mr. Baines." Nahum said this with mild
amazement. His amazement would have been no greater--and not a whit less
mild--had his daughter announced her intention to swim from New York to
Liverpool, or to marry the chef of the Czar of Russia.

"Um!... Can't say's that's onnatural--so's to require callin' in a
doctor. Live five mile from town, don't you? Nearest neighbor nigh on to
a mile. Sairy gits to see company only about so often or not so seldom
as that, eh?" Scattergood shut his eyes until there appeared at the
corners of them a network of little wrinkles. "I'm a-goin' to astonish
you, Nahum. This here hain't the first girl that ever come down with the
complaint Sairy's got!... They's been sev'ral. Complaint's older 'n you
or me.... Dum near as old as Deacon Pettybone. Uh-huh!... She's got a
attack of life, Nahum, and the only cure for it ever discovered is to
let her live.... Sairy's woke up out of childhood, Nahum. She's jest
openin' her eyes. Perty soon she'll be stirrin' around brisk.... When
you goin' to drive her in, Nahum? To-morrer?"

"You--you advise letting her do this thing?"

"When you goin' to fetch her in, Nahum?" Scattergood repeated.

"She said she was coming Monday."

"Um!... G'-by, Nahum." This was Scattergood's invariable phrase of
dismissal, given to friend or enemy alike. It was characteristic of him
that when he was through with a conversation he ended it--and left no
doub