in' about doin' the work
around the house and garden, an' then you got to git a hired girl.
Specially the washin'!"

"Seems to me it'd be cheaper in the long run to work a hired girl to
death rather than a wife," said Anderson tartly.

"Most generally it is," agreed Mr. Loop. "But I sorter got into the
habit of marryin' hired girls, figgerin' they make the best kind of
wives. I give 'em a good home, plenty to eat an'--" His eyes roamed
aloft, as if searching for some other beneficence, and finally lighting
on Dr. Brown's door-plate, found something to clinch his argument. "An'
as fine a funeral as any woman could ask fer!" he concluded.

"Let's git back to the main question," said Anderson unfeelingly. He
didn't have much use for Eliphalet. "What fer sort of lookin' feller is
this man your wife's been carryin' on with?"

"Well," began Mr. Loop, squinting his bleary eyes reflectively, "I ain't
never seen him 'cept when he was runnin', an' it was after dark
besides. Twice I seen him jump out of one of our back winders when I got
home earlier'n usual from lodge-meetin'. First time I made out he was a
burglar an' hustled in to see if he had took anything. You see, I allus
keep my pocketbook in a burey drawer in our bedroom; an' natcherly, as
it was our bedroom winder he jumped out of, I--well, natcherly I'd be a
little uneasy, wouldn't I?"

"Specially if you thought your wife might 'a' been rendered insensible
by the robber," said Anderson.

"Natcherly," said Mr. Loop quickly. "Course, I thought of her first of
all. Well, after I went to the burey an' found the pocketbook all safe,
I asked Anna if she'd heard anybody tryin' to get in through the winder.
She looked kinder funny-like fer a second er two an' then said no, she
hadn't. I told her what I'd seen, and she said I must be drunk er
somethin', 'cause she'd been in the room all the time havin' a bite of
somethin' to eat 'fore goin' to bed. I never saw anybody that could eat
more'n that woman, Anderson. She's allus eatin'. Course I believed her
_that_ time, 'cause there was a plate o' cold ham an' some salt-risin'
biscuits an', oh, a lot of other victuals on the washstand, with only
one knife an' fork. Her mother was sound asleep in her room upstairs;
an' her sister Gertie,--who come to visit us six months ago an' is still
visitin' us an' eatin' more'n any two hired men you ever saw,--Gertie,
she was out in the kitchen readin' that Swede paper my wife takes. An'
s