thing from which she could
not wash Grit's grimy fingermarks, and so she disliked it even more
than the sticky molasses jug. "Him and his book and his brown molasses
jug!" One was gone forever, and soon she would get rid of the other
two.

And yet, even as she thought this, her eyes moved slowly to the door,
and she could not help visualizing Grit as he had appeared every
evening at dusk. His baggy breeches had seemed always to precede him
into the room. The rest of him would follow--his thin shoulders, from
which there hung a greenish coat, frayed at the sleeves; above this,
his long, collarless neck, his pointed chin and broken nose, that
leaned toward the hollow and smudges of his cheek.

He would lock the door quickly and stand there, looking at Nell.

"Why did he always lock the door?" mused Great Taylor. "Nothing here
to steal! Why'd he stand there like that?" Every night she had
expected him to say something, but he never did. Instead, he would
take a long breath, almost like a sigh, and, after closing his eyes
for a moment, he would move into the room and light the screeching
gas-jet. "Never thought of turning down the gas." This, particularly,
was a sore point with Great Taylor. "Never thought of anything. Just
dropped into the best chair."

"It's a good chair, Nell," he would say, "only one rung missing." And
he would remain silent, drooping there, wrists crossed in his lap,
palms turned upward, fingers curled, until supper had been placed
before him on the table. "Fingers bent like claws," muttered Great
Taylor, "and doing nothing while I set the table."

Sometimes he would eat enormously, which irritated Nell; sometimes he
would eat nothing except bread and molasses, which irritated Nell even
more. "A good molasses jug," he would say; "got it for a dime. Once I
set a price I'm a stone wall; never give in." This was his one boast,
his stock phrase. After using it he would look up at his wife for a
word of approval; and as the word of approval was never forthcoming,
he would repeat: "Nell, I'm a stone wall; never give in."

After supper he would ask what she had been doing all day. A weary,
almost voiceless, man, he had told her nothing. But Great Taylor while
washing the dishes would rattle off everything that had happened since
that morning. She seldom omitted any important detail, for she knew by
experience that Grit would sit there, silent, wrists crossed and palms
turned up, waiting. He had always