As I stopped at the edge of the stoop and respectfully took my cap off, the dog gave a low growl, then lay down, keeping one topaz eye fastened upon me suspiciously. The fat old lady paid no more attention to me than if I had been a hen or a duck, but sent her needles flying the faster. I regarded her in silent wonder for a moment. Her dress was a plain one-piece garment of some dark, cheap stuff, utterly unrelieved from somberness except for a row of shiny white horn buttons down the front. Her feet were large and flat, and were encased in carpet slippers with a gaudy pattern of alternate crimson and green. She wore iron rimmed spectacles which rested so near the tip of her pudgy nose I wondered they didn't fall off. Her gray hair was parted very precisely in the middle and slicked back close to her head. Her mouth was thin and hard, and her face acrid looking. "Uh-h-h--good morning," I said, hitching at my trousers; an unconsciously nervous action. "_Marnin'!_" I jumped--really I did--for it was as though she had let a gun off in my face. I had never heard such a voice. Vinegary? Well! I curled my fingers around my chin and looked at the dog. His fiery eye had not wavered. Then I looked at the cat--for in that moment I was firmly convinced this old beldam _was_ a cat. Her mouth had squared into yet firmer lines, and her brow had grown portentous. Still her needles fussed about the half-made sock in her yellowish hands, and her gaze was down, as before. "Do the--" I started to ask if people by their name lived here, but when I came to the name I could not supply it; I had never heard it. I stammered, coughed, then knew that a pair of fierce little green eyes were flashing at me. "Air yo' a plum' fule? Whur air yo' wits 'n' yo' tongue 'n' yo' commin sinse? Can't yo' tell a body whut yo' want wi'out stam'rin' 'n' stutt'rin' 'n' takin' all th' day? Folks as has got work to do ain't got no time to waste on tramps 'n' sich! _Talk!_" Like a cyclone this tirade enveloped me, bursting upon my ears in a high, rasping voice which dragged on my nerves after the manner of a file. I became desperate. This old virago should not oust me. I thrust my body forward, and, chin out, replied with some heat: "Is this where Granny, and Granf'er, and Lessie live? That's what I want to know?" "Land sakes! Jony 'n' th' w'ale!... Air _you_ him?" Her hands dropped in her lap; she cocked her head and viewed me afresh. During the momentary silence which followed I heard shuffling footsteps within, and an old man appeared in the open doorway in front of me. He wore a shirt made of bed ticking; his trousers were not visible, because of the coffee-sack which wrapped him from his waist to his shoes. He was bald, his white beard was a fringe about his face, his upper lip shaven. He was drying a white dinner plate of thick ironstone china with a cloth. "S'firy!" he said, in a squeaky, timorous voice; "S'firy!" He got no further.