's because I was dreaming of some young
lady a-coming to pay me a visit."

"Well, dreams never come up to expectations, do they?"

"Then it's dreaming I am, still," retorted Mr. Tiernan, quickly.

Janet laughed. His tone, though bantering, was respectful. One of the
secrets of Mr. Tiernan's very human success was due to his ability to
estimate his fellow creatures. His manner of treating Janet, for
instance, was quite different from that he employed in dealing with Lise.
In the course of one interview he had conveyed to Lise, without arousing
her antagonism, the conviction that it was wiser to trust him than to
attempt to pull wool over his eyes. Janet had the intelligence to trust
him; and to-night, as she faced him, the fact was brought home to her
with peculiar force that this wiry-haired little man was the person above
all others of her immediate acquaintance to seek in time of trouble. It
was his great quality. Moreover, Mr. Tiernan, even in his morning
greetings as she passed, always contrived to convey to her, in some
unaccountable fashion, the admiration and regard in which he held her,
and the effect of her contact with him was invariably to give her a
certain objective image of herself, an increased self-confidence and
self-respect. For instance, by the light dancing in Mr. Tiernan's eyes as
he regarded her, she saw herself now as the mainstay of the helpless
family in the clay-yellow flat across the street. And there was nothing,
she was convinced, Mr. Tiernan did not know about that family. So she
said:--"I've come to see about the stove."

"Sure," he replied, as much as to say that the visit was not unexpected.
"Well, I've been thinking about it, Miss Janet. I've got a stove here I
know'll suit your mother. It's a Reading, it's almost new. Ye'd better be
having a look at it yourself."

He led her into a chaos of stoves, grates, and pipes at the back of the
store.

"It's in need of a little polish," he added, as he turned on a light,
"but it's sound, and a good baker, and economical with coal." He opened
the oven and took off the lids.

"I'm afraid I don't know much about stoves," she told him. "But I'll
trust your judgment. How much is it?" she inquired hesitatingly.

He ran his hand through his corkscrewed hair, his familiar gesture.

"Well, I'm willing to let ye have it for twenty-five dollars. If that's
too much--mebbe we can find another."

"Can you put it in to-morrow morning?" she asked.