"And then," he continued, reflectively, "I've no objection to a little happiness before I slip over the side of this shaky old ship of Death in Life. I've been watching this son of yours. He likes to be razzled-dazzled, and I'd like to be razzled-dazzled, too, when I come home from the factory after the moil and toil of the day, and the breakneck work of trying to upset every other man in my chase for that last dollar. I'd like to find a comfortable little creature ready to chuck me under the chin and say, 'Lovey dovey, you're the smartest boy of the crowd.'" This talk seemed immoral to Mrs. Prymmer, yet she was too dazed to resent it. She was going to lose her boarder, and her fingers suddenly grew cold and nervously unplucked the bars of her knitting. "Lawks-a-daisy!" he exclaimed. "See what you're a-doing, Hippolyta. Here, drop that," and, taking her ravelled work from her, he deposited it on the table. "Micah," she said, running her tongue over her dry lips, "Micah, who is she?" "This little monument,--oh, a snug-sized woman a thought over my own age." "A bold-faced hussy," hissed Mrs. Prymmer. "Soft, now, soft--don't be hard on her. You may have to live with her, and she's made of the best Maine blue-black slate, warranted to outlast any slate in the world, and that will give you some sharp notches if you run against it." Mrs. Prymmer's lower jaw got beyond her control, and began to sag hopelessly. If another bride were introduced into her house she might as well be thinking of her own tombstone. "Come, now, what'll you take her for?" said Captain White, waggishly. "Your lowest bid." The mention of money was a slight restorative. "Twenty dollars apiece," gasped a cracked voice, "twenty dollars apiece." "Come, now, Hippolyta, that's hard on her. She'll be as mute to you as a stained-glass window. She ain't like me. She'll never trouble you coming in late at night or nagging about her food." Mrs. Prymmer angrily hurled a boarding-house sentiment at him, "I'd rather take twenty men than one woman." "That don't sound proper," he replied, rebukingly, "and shows a staggering amount of ignorance of men-critters. Why, if you knew the badness of me, for example, you'd turn me out of your house to-morrow." "I don't believe it," she said, stoutly. "It's true, Hippolyta. If you knew what diabolical, heathenish things men are up to you'd scream from morning to night, and only stop long enough to take refreshments." Again her husky voice assured him that she didn't believe him. "Do you believe the newspapers?" She told him that she did. "Who writes all those awful things?"