and
unsympathetic world, and that it was her duty to look after him much
as she would a child. She was in the habit of walking over whenever
she pleased and giving directions to Mary McGuire in regard to matters
which she thought needed attention in his house. And all this had been
done in the most open and matter-of-fact way, so that the most
accomplished gossip in Durford never accused her of making matrimonial
advances to the lonesome widower. Even Jonathan himself had been
clever enough to see that she regarded him much as she would an
overgrown boy, and had always accepted her many attentions without
misinterpreting them. She was a born manager, and she managed him;
that was all. Nothing could be more unsentimental than the way in
which she would make him take off his coat during a friendly call, and
let her sponge and press it for him; or the imperative fashion in
which she sent him to the barber's to have his beard trimmed. How
could a man make love to a woman after she had acted like this?

But he reminded himself that if he was ever to win her he must begin
to carry out the advice outlined by Mrs. Betty; and so the apparently
unsuspecting Hepsey would find on her side porch in the morning some
specially fine corn which had been placed there after dark without the
name of the donor. Once a fine melon was accompanied by a bottle of
perfumery; and again a basket of peaches had secreted in its center a
package of toilet soap "strong enough to kill the grass," as Hepsey
remarked as she sniffed at it. Finally matters reached a climax when a
bushel of potatoes arrived on the scene in the early dawn, and with it
a canary bird in a tin cage. When Hepsey saw Jonathan later, she
remarked casually that she "guessed she'd keep the potatoes; but she
didn't need a canary bird any more than a turtle needs a tooth-pick;
and he had better take it away and get his money back."

However, Jonathan never allowed her occasional rebuffs to discourage
him or stop his attentions. He kept a close watch on all Hepsey's
domestic interests, and if there were any small repairs to be made at
Thunder Cliff, a hole in the roof to be mended, or the bricks on the
top of the chimney to be relaid, or the conductor pipe to be
readjusted, Jonathan was on the spot. Then Jonathan would receive in
return a layer cake with chopped walnuts in the filling, and would
accept it in the same matter-of-fact way in which Hepsey permitted his
services as genera