time than have to live with a
cantankerous saint. Miss Cobb and I had had many a fight over it, but at
that time there wasn't much likelihood of either of us being called on
to choose.

Well, we went down to Mr. Moody's room, and he was sitting up in bed
with his knees drawn up to his chin and a hot-water bottle held to him.

"Look at your work, woman," he said to me when I opened the door.

"I'm dying!"

"You look sick," I said, going over to the bed. It never does to cross
them when they get to the water-bottle stage. "The pharmacy clerk's gone
to a dance over at Trimble's, but I guess I can find you some whisky."

"Do have some whisky, George," begged Mrs. Moody, remembering her
brother-in-law.

"I never touch the stuff and you both know it," he snarled. He had a
fresh pain just then and stopped, clutching up the bottle. "Besides," he
finished, when it was over, "I haven't got any whisky."

Well, to make a long story short, we got him to agree to some whisky
from the pharmacy, with a drop of peppermint in it, if he could wash it
down with spring water so it wouldn't do him any harm.

"There isn't any spring water in the house," I said, losing my temper a
little, "and I'm not going out there in my bedroom slippers, Mr.
Moody. I don't see why your eating what you shouldn't needs to give me
pneumonia."

Mrs. Moody was standing beside the bed, and I saw her double chin
begin to work. If you have ever seen a fat woman, in a short red kimono
holding a candle by, a bed, and crying, you know how helpless she looks.

"Don't go, Minnie," she sniffled. "It would be too awful. If you are
afraid you could take the poker."

"I'm not going!" I declared firmly. "It's--it's dratted idiocy, that's
all. Plain water would do well enough. There's a lot of people think
whisky is poison with water, anyhow. Where's the pitcher?"

Oh, yes, I went. I put on some stockings of Mrs. Moody's and a petticoat
and a shawl and started. It was when I was in the pharmacy looking for
the peppermint that I first noticed my joint again. A joint like that's
a blessing or a curse, the way you look at it.

I found the peppermint and some whisky and put them on the stairs. Then
I took my pitcher and lantern and started for the spring-house. It was
still snowing, and part of the time Mrs. Moody's stockings were up to
their knees. The wind was blowing hard, and when I rounded the corner
of the house my lantern went out. I stood there in the storm