m. I may
linger a bit, but the good Lord won't move me on too soon."

Barbara curbed her impatience to reach the end, going back to the
beginning. "Well, then, was it you who found 'im?"

"It was this wye, miss. Knowin' 'e wasn't in the 'ouse, I kep' goin'
to my winder and listenin'--and then goin' back to bed agyne--I
couldn't tell you 'ow many times; and then, if you'd believe it I must
'ave fell asleep. No; I can't believe as I was asleep. I just seemed
to come to, like, and as I laid there wonderin' what time it was,
seems to me as if I 'eard a kind of a snore, like, not in the 'ouse,
but comin' up from the street."

"What time was that?"

"That'd be about 'alf past one. Well, up I gets and creeps to the
winder, and sure enough the snore come right up from the steps. Seems
to me, too, I could see somethink layin' there, all up and down the
steps, just as if it 'ad been dropped by haccident like. My blood
freezes. I slips into my thick dressin' gown--no, it was my thin
dressin' gown--I always keeps two--one for winter and one for
summer--and this spring bein' so early like----"

"But in the end you got down stairs."

"If I didn't, miss, 'ow could I 'a' found 'im? I ain't one to be
afryde of dynger, not even 'ere in New York, where you can be robbed
and murdered without 'ardly knowin' it--and the police that slow about
follerin' up a clue----"

"And what happened when you'd opened the front door?"

"I didn't open it at once, miss. I put my hear to the crack and
listened. And there it was, a long kind of snore, like--only it wasn't
just what you'd call a snore. It was more like this." He drew a deep,
rasping, stertorous breath. "Awful, it was, miss, just like somebody
in liquor. 'It's liquor,' I says, and not wantin' to be mixed up in no
low company I wasn't for openin' the door at all----"

"But you did?"

"Not till I'd gone 'alf wye upstairs and down agyne. I'm like that. I
often thinks I'll not do a thing, and then I'll sye to myself, 'Now,
perhaps I'd better, and so it was that time. 'E's out, I says, and who
knows but what 'e's fell in a fynt like?' So back I goes, and I peeps
out a little bit--just my nose out, as you might sye, not knowin' but
what if there was low company----"

"When did you find out who it was?"

"I knowed the 'at, like. It was that 'at what 'e bought afore 'e
bought the last one. No; I don't know but what 'e's bought two since
'e bought that one--a soft felt, and a cowboy what