itution.

"What do you make of it, Mame?" he asked anxiously of his wife when he
reached home. His step was more shambling than ever, and his hands,
clutching his hat-brim, trembled more than her gnarled, palsied ones.

"I'll tell you what I think when I've been around to Mrs. Lindsay's
this afternoon--to 46 Jefferson Place."

"What're you goin' to do there? You can't ask for him, very well,"
objected her spouse.

"Do?" she retorted tartly. "What would I do in a boarding-house? Look
for rooms for us, of course, and inquire about the other lodgers to be
sure it's respectable for a decent, middle-aged, married couple. Do
you think I'm goin' lookin' for a long-lost son? The life must be
gettin' you at last, Wally! Your head ain't what it used to be."

But Mrs. Pennold's vaunted astuteness gained her little knowledge
which could be of value to her in their late acquaintance. Mrs.
Lindsay was a beetle-browed, enormously stout old lady, with a stern
eye and commanding presence, who looked as if in her younger days she
might well have been a police-matron--as indeed she had been. She had
two double rooms and a single hall bedroom to show for inspection, and
she waxed surprisingly voluble concerning the vacancy of the latter,
at the first tentative mention of her other lodgers, by her visitor.

"As nice a young man as ever you'd wish to see, ma'am. I don't have
none but the most refined people in my house. Lived with me a year and
a half, Mr. Hicks did, except for his vacation--regular as clockwork
in his bills, and free and open-handed with his tips to Delia. Of
course, he wasn't just what you might call steady in his goings-out
and comings-in, but there never was nothin' objectionable in his
habits. You know what young men is! He had a fine position in a bank
here in Brooklyn, but I don't think the company he kep' was all that
it might have been. Kind of flashy and sporty, his friends was, and I
guess that's what got him into trouble. For trouble he was in, ma'am,
when he paid me yesterday in full even to the shavin' mug which I'd
bought for his dresser, and meant him to keep for a present--and
picked up bag and baggage and left. I always did think Friday was an
unlucky day! He stood in the vestibule and shook both my hands, and
there wasn't a dry eye in his head or mine!

"'Mis' Lindsay!' he says to me, just like I'm tellin' it to you. 'Mis'
Lindsay, I can't stay here no longer. I wisht to heavings I could, for
you'v