ere was a shot in the locker.

"She went to the closet and found that Kenelm's Sunday hat and coat was
gone. Then she locked the back door again and cut acrost the lots down
to Abbie's. She crept round the back way and peeked under the curtain
at the settin'-room window. There set Abbie, lookin' sweet and sugary.
Likewise, there was Kenelm, lookin' mighty comfortable, with a big
cigar in his mouth and more on the table side of him. Hannah gritted her
teeth, but she kept quiet.

"About ten minutes after that Chris Badger was consider'ble surprised to
hear a knock at the back door of his store and to find that 'twas Hannah
that had knocked.

"'Mr. Badger,' says Hannah, polite and smilin', 'I want to buy a box of
the best cigars you've got.'

"'Ma'am!' says Chris, thinkin' 'twas about time to send for the
constable or the doctor--one or t'other.

"'Yes,' says Hannah; 'if you please. Oh! and, Mr. Badger, please don't
tell anyone I bought 'em. PLEASE don't, to oblige me.'

"So Chris trotted out the cigars--ten cents straight, they was--and said
nothin' to nobody, which is a faculty he has when it pays to have it.

"When Kenelm came home that night he was knocked pretty nigh off his
pins to find his sister waitin' for him. He commenced a long rigmarole
about where he'd been, but Hannah didn't ask no questions. She said that
Washington was mighty fine, but home and Kenelm was good enough for her.
Said the thoughts of him alone had been with her every minute, and she
just HAD to cut the trip short. Kenelm wa'n't any too enthusiastic to
hear it.

"Breakfast next mornin' was a dream. Hannah had been up since five
o'clock gettin' it ready. There was everything on that table that Kenelm
liked 'special. And it all tasted fine, and he ate enough for four. When
'twas over Hannah went to the closet and brought out a bundle.

"'Kenelm,' she says, 'here's somethin' I brought you that'll
surprise you. I've noticed since I've been away that about everybody
smokes--senators and judges, and even Smithsonian Institute folks. And
when I see how much comfort they get out of it, my conscience hurt me
to think that I'd deprived my brother of what he got such a sight of
pleasure from. Kenelm, you can begin smokin' again right off. Here's
a box of cigars I bought on purpose for you; they're the kind the
President smokes.'

"Which wa'n't a bad yarn for a church member that hadn't had any more
practice than Hannah had.

"Well, Kenelm wa