The times., 1900-12-23

of course / knew that even so, when l
got there, if there was any neighbors
visiting I'd wait.
'It was just q simple, plain house,
without any curlycues or jimcracks about
il, and standing back from the road may
be thirty or forty feet II was in place
not very far out that had bsen all farm
ing. but was growing up now with the
houses of people from the city.
THE woman herself let me in when I
pulled the bell. | imagined when l was
there before that she was the only person
living there; | knew it now the minute
got inside the dov'. Not because she let
me in, of course; she'd have done that
anyhow; but l cal tell an empty house. for
instance, the minute I get inside OF It, and
1 can sense ii, too. whether there's many
or few or only one in house. She lived
alone.
THE parlor Where she took me when
she'd shut the front door was room like
I've seen lots Of Square room, Brussels
carpet. haircloth furniture, cylinder stove.
and all that, kerosene lamp on the shelf,
with no shade ON IT, so that | could see
her plain-I thought of it afterward that
maybe she left the shade off it so that
she could see me-and you understand, l
hadn't seen her at all before. l was ac-
tually looking at her now for the first
time. Of course I'd heard her voice, and
could make a fair guess at her by that,
but here she zas now where could look
at her, fai: and square.
And she wasn't a bad looking woman,
either, by any sort of means. She-but
I'm no judge of woplans age; but she
was under forty anyhow. And a little
above the average height of women for
them days, and a little stockier and
heavier; and a resolute woman, as I'd
have guessed by her voice, and of course
as / knew by her holding me up the way
she did the first time I was there about
the picture. l had the picture with me
now, and | forked over.
Poor man., she said; it's seven years
now since he died.
And then l expected to see her pin IL
on to her dress at her throat, where folks
wear such things, but she didn't She set
it up en- the shelf against the wall. and
left it standing there. She thanked ne
for bringing it back and wanted to ray
me for my trouble and all that, and then
she began to talk 10 me about myself and
to sort of sympathize with me,
"she thought 1 must be driven into
my miserable way of living by having
no home. no place TO go. and | didn't
let on to her that I'd got the incest
wife that ever lived and two likeliest
children. Somehow l thought that that
would only irritate her, and thought she
wouldn't take any more interest in me
after that. So just says nothing about
that and lets her do most Of the talking,
and in the course of that she tells me
about how he'd left her that house and
81 600, and how she'd got that out on
mortgages, and SO on. And she'd had Of
fers, more than one, but she thought they
were all after her money, but she sup
posed she'd have to get married some
time. and so on. And / don't want to
seem vain, but 1 was younger then than
| am now, and wasn't that just as fair
and square an offer as anybody could
have?
Il amt much of a talker. but. of
course, l made myself as polite as
could and after a while | gets up and
goes. There was two houses in that
place-I saw them both, both times was
would have been easy. and
| would have liked to tackle, but |
never tried EN- in fact, l never went
back there at all; don't know but what
might meet more folks there that had !
lost their pictures"