n take care
of 'most anything that's liable to have happened. If he ain't put the
bridle to bed in the stall and hung the mare up on the harness pegs I
judge I can handle the job. Wonder how fur along he'd got. Didn't hear
him singin' anything about 'Hyannis on the Cape,' did you, boy?"

"No."

"That's some comfort. Now, don't you worry, Mother. I'll be back in a
few minutes."

Mrs. Snow clasped her hands. "Oh, I HOPE he hasn't set the barn afire,"
she wailed.

"No danger of that, I guess. No, Rachel, you 'tend to your supper. I
don't need you."

He tramped out into the hall and the door closed behind him. Mrs. Snow
turned apologetically to her puzzled grandson, who was entirely at a
loss to know what the trouble was about.

"You see, Albert," she hesitatingly explained, "Laban--Mr. Keeler--the
man who drove you down from the depot--he--he's an awful nice man and
your grandfather thinks the world and all of him, but--but every once in
a while he--Oh, dear, I don't know how to say it to you, but--"

Evidently Mrs. Ellis knew how to say it, for she broke into the
conversation and said it then and there.

"Every once in a while he gets tipsy," she snapped. "And I only wish I
had my fingers this minute in the hair of the scamp that gave him the
liquor."

A light broke upon Albert's mind. "Oh! Oh, yes!" he exclaimed. "I
thought he acted a little queer, and once I thought I smelt--Oh, that
was why he was eating the peppermints!"

Mrs. Snow nodded. There was a moment of silence. Suddenly the
housekeeper, who had resumed her seat in compliance with Captain
Zelotes' order, slammed back her chair and stood up.

"I've hated the smell of peppermint for twenty-two year," she declared,
and went out into the kitchen. Albert, looking after her, felt his
grandmother's touch upon his sleeve.

"I wouldn't say any more about it before her," she whispered. "She's
awful sensitive."

Why in the world the housekeeper should be particularly sensitive
because the man who had driven him from the station ate peppermint was
quite beyond the boy's comprehension. Nor could he thoroughly understand
why the suspicion of Mr. Keeler's slight inebriety should cause such a
sensation in the Snow household. He was inclined to think the tipsiness
rather funny. Of course alcohol was lectured against often enough
at school and on one occasion a member of the senior class--a
twenty-year-old "hold-over" who should have graduated the fall
before