em, if he is."

"I heard he went to Sunday School with Lois, through the rain."

"How did you know?" said Lois.

"Why shouldn't I know?"

"I thought nobody was out but me."

"Do you think folks will see an umbrella walkin' up street in the rain,
and not look to see if there's somebody under it?"

"_I_ shouldn't," said Lois. "When should an umbrella be out walking,
but in the rain?"

"Well, go along. What sort of a man is he? and what brings him to
Shampuashuh?"

"He came to see Mrs. Barclay," said Madge.

"He's a sort of man you are willin' to take trouble for," said Charity.
"Real nice, and considerate; and to hear him talk, it is as good as a
book; and he's awfully polite. You should have seen him marching in
here with Lois's wet cloak, out to the kitchen with it, and hangin' it
up. So to pay, I turned round and hung up his'n. One good turn deserves
another, I told him. But at first, I declare, I thought I couldn't keep
from laughin'."

Mrs. Marx laughed a little here. "I know the sort," she said. "Wears
kid gloves always and a little line of hair over his upper lip, and is
lazy like. I would lose all my patience to have one o' them round for
long, smokin' a cigar every other thing, and poisonin' all the air for
half a mile."

"I think he _is_ sort o' lazy," said Charity.

"He don't smoke," said Lois.

"Yes he does," said Madge. "I found an end of cigar just down by the
front steps, when I was sweeping."

"I don't think he's a lazy man, either," said Lois. "That slow, easy
way does not mean laziness."

"What does it mean?" inquired Mrs. Marx sharply.

"It is nothing to us what it means," said Mrs. Armadale, speaking for
the first time. "We have no concern with this man. He came to see Mrs.
Barclay, his friend, and I suppose he'll never come again."

"Why shouldn't he come again, mother?" said Charity. "If she's his
friend, he might want to see her more than once, seems to me. And
what's more, he _is_ coming again. I heard him askin' her if he might;
and then Mrs. Barclay asked me if it would be convenient, and I said it
would, of course. He said he would be comin' back from Boston in a few
weeks, and he would like to stop again as he went by. And do you know
_I_ think she coloured. It was only a little, but she ain't a woman to
blush much; and _I_ believe she knows why he wants to come, as well as
he does."

"Nonsense, Charity!" said Madge incredulously.

"Then half the world are busy with no