rangle un by inches, an' give
un the hell of a twistin'. You caan't buy a easy death seemin'ly."

"A gude husband he was, but jealous," said Mrs. Coomstock, her thoughts
busy among past years; and Billy immediately fell in with this view.

"Then you'm well rid of un. Theer's as gude in the world alive any
minute as ever was afore or will be again."

"Let 'em stop in the world then. I doan't want 'em."

This sentiment amused the widow herself more than Billy. She laughed
uproariously, raised her glass to her lips unconsciously, found it
empty, grew instantly grave upon the discovery, set it down again, and
sighed.

"It's a wicked world," she said. "Sure as men's in a plaace they brings
trouble an' wickedness. An' yet I've heard theer's more women than men
on the airth when all's said."

"God A'mighty likes 'em best, I reckon," declared Mr. Blee.

"Not but what 't would be a lonesome plaace wi'out the lords of
creation," conceded the widow.

"Ess fay, you 'm right theer; but the beauty of things is that none need
n't be lonely, placed same as you be."

"'Once bit twice shy,'" said Mrs. Coomstock. Then she laughed again. "I
said them very words to Lezzard not an hour since."

"An' what might he have answered?" inquired Billy without, however,
showing particular interest to know.

"He said he wasn't bit. His wife was a proper creature."

"Bah! second-hand gudes--that's what Lezzard be--a widow-man an' eighty
if a day. A poor, coffin-ripe auld blid, wi' wan leg in the graave any
time this twenty year."

Mrs. Coomstock's frame heaved at this tremendous criticism. She gurgled
and gazed at Billy with her eyes watering and her mouth open.

"You say that! Eighty an' coffin-ripe!"

"Ban't no ontruth, neither. A man 's allus ready for his elm overcoat
arter threescore an' ten. I heard the noise of his breathin' paarts when
he had brown kitty in the fall three years ago, an' awnly thrawed it off
thanks to the gracious gudeness of Miller Lyddon, who sent rich stock
for soup by my hand. But to hear un, you might have thought theer was a
wapsies' nest in the man's lungs."

"I doan't want to be nuss to a chap at my time of life, in coourse."

"No fay; 't is the man's paart to look arter his wife, if you ax me. I
be a plain bachelor as never thought of a female serious 'fore I seed
you. An' I've got a heart in me, tu. Ban't no auld, rubbishy, worn-out
thing, neither, but a tough, love-tight heart--at least so 't was t