idge, papa?" she asked.

"Yes," he answered, and then as she tripped away, said:

"She's one of my adopted children." He gazed between his knees at the
sidewalk.

"Have you many others?"

"Three."

"Raising them, are you?"

"Yes."

"They seem to think, down in Noank, that living as you do and giving
everything away is satisfactory to you but rather hard on your wife and
children."

"Well, it is true that she did feel a little uncertain in the beginning,
but she's never wanted for anything. She'll tell you herself that she's
never been without a thing that she really needed, and she's been
happy."

He paused to meditate, I presume, over the opinion of his former fellow
townsmen, and then added:

"It's true, there have been times when we have been right where we had
to have certain things pretty badly, before they came, but they never
failed to come."

While he was still talking, Mrs. Potter came around the corner of the
house and out upon the sidewalk. She was going to the Saturday evening
market in the city below.

"Here she is," he said. "Now you can ask her."

"What is it?" she inquired, turning a serene and smiling face to me.

"They still think, down in Noank, that you're not very happy with me,"
he said. "They're afraid you want for something once in a while."

She took this piece of neighborly interference in better fashion than
most would, I fancy.

"I have never wanted for anything since I have been married to my
husband," she said. "I am thoroughly contented."

She looked at him and he at her, and there passed between them an
affectionate glance.

"Yes," he said, when she had passed after a pleasing little
conversation, "my wife has been a great help to me. She has never
complained."

"People are inclined to talk a little," I said.

"Well, you see, she never complained, but she did feel a little bit
worried in the beginning."

"Have you a mission or a church here in Norwich?"

"No, I don't believe in churches."

"Not in churches?"

"No. The sight of a minister preaching the word of God for so much a
year is all a mockery to me."

"What do you believe in?"

"Personal service. Churches and charitable institutions and societies
are all valueless. You can't reach your fellowman that way. They build
up buildings and pay salaries--but there's a better way." (I was
thinking of St. Francis and his original dream, before they threw him
out and established monasteries and a costume o