this. There now,
you missed a chance, Hannah. You and he ought to have got married that
time when you went away together."

Miss Parker turned pale. "When we went--away--TOGETHER!" she faltered.
"WHAT are you talkin' about?"

"When you went over to the Cattle Show that time."

"Is that what you meant?"

"Sartin. What are you glarin' at me that way for? You ain't been away
together any other time, have you? No, Hannah, that was your chance. You
and Caleb might have been married in the balloon, like the couples we
read about in the papers. Ho! ho! Think of the advertisin' you'd have
had! 'A high church weddin'.' 'Bride and groom up in the air.' Can't you
see those headlines?"

Hannah appeared more relieved than annoyed.

"Humph!" she sniffed. "Well, I should say YOU was up in the air, Obed
Bangs. What's the matter with you this mornin'? Has the rain soaked into
your head? It seems to be softenin' up pretty fast. If you're so set on
somebody gettin' married why don't you get married yourself? You've been
what the minister calls 'unattackted' all your life."

The minister had said "unattached," but Captain Obed did not offer
to correct the quotation. He joked no more and, during breakfast, was
silent and absent-minded.

After breakfast he went out for a walk. The storm had gullied the hills
and flooded the hollows. There were pools of water everywhere, shining
cold and steely in the winter sunshine. The captain remembered the low
ground in which the barn and outbuildings upon the "Cap'n Abner place"
stood, and judged that he and Kenelm might have to do some rescue work
among the poultry later on. He went back to the house to suggest that
work to Mr. Parker himself.

Kenelm and his sister were evidently in the midst of a dispute. The
former was seated at the breakfast table and Hannah was standing by the
kitchen door looking at him.

"Goin' off to work Christmas Day!" she said, as the captain entered. "I
should think you might stay home with me THAT day, if no other. 'Tain't
the work you're so anxious to get to. It's that precious inmate of
yours."

Kenelm's answer was as surprising as it was emphatic.

"Darn the inmate!" he shouted. "I wish to thunder I'd never seen her!"

Captain Obed whistled. Miss Parker staggered, but she recovered
promptly.

"Oh," she said, "that's how you feel, is it? Well, if I felt that way
toward anybody I don't think I'd be plannin' to marry 'em."

"Ugh! What's the use of talk