"Yes. So long as it keeps on comin'. His dividends, you say? I thought the story was that he hadn't any stocks left to get dividends from. I thought he told all hands that he was poverty-stricken, that when he was cut out of the Harbor property and the fifty thousand he hadn't a copper." "Oh no not as bad as that. He had some stocks and bonds, of course. Why, if he hadn't where would he get _any_ money from? How could he live?" "I don't know. He seems to be livin', though, and pretty well. Has he got the parlor yet?" "Yes, and it's fixed up so pretty. He's got his pictures and things around. Wouldn't you like to see it? He's out, you know." They went into the parlor and the bedroom adjoining, that which the captain had occupied during his stay. Both rooms were as neat as wax--Sears expected that, knowing his sister's housekeeping--but he had scarcely expected to find the rooms so changed. The furniture was the same, but the wall decorations were not. "What's become of the alum basket and the wax wreath and the Rock of Ages chromo?" he asked. "Oh, he took 'em down. That is, he didn't do it himself, of course, but he had Joel do it. They're up attic. Mr. Phillips said they was so like the things that his wife used to have in the dear old home that he couldn't bear to see 'em. They reminded him so of her. He asked if we would mind if they was removed and we said no, of course." "Humph! And the Macomber family coffin plates, those you had set out on black velvet with all Joel's dead relations names on 'em, in the plush and gilt frame? Are those up attic, too?" "Yes." "I should have thought 'twould have broken Joel's heart to part with _them_!" "Sears, you're makin' fun. I don't blame you much. I always did hate those coffin plates, but Joel seemed to like 'em. They were in his folks' front parlor, he says." "Yes. That 'Death of Washin'ton' picture and the rounder-case thing with the locks of hair in it were there, too, you told me once. That must have been a lively room. Those--er--horse pictures are Egbert's, I suppose?" "Yes. He is real fond of horses." The "horse pictures" were colored plates of racers. "That's a portrait of his wife over there," explained Sarah. "She had it painted in Italy on purpose for him." "Is that so? Well, I'm glad it was for him. I shouldn't think it was hardly fittin' for anybody outside the family. Of course Italy's a warm climate, but----" "_Sears!_" Mrs. Macomber blushed. "Of course I didn't mean _that_ picture," she protested. "And you know I didn't. I wouldn't have that one up at all if I had _my_ way. But he says it's an old master and very famous and all like that. Maybe so, but I'm thankful the children ain't allowed in here. That's Lobelia over there." In the bedroom were other pictures, photographs for the most part. Many of them were autographed. "They're girl friends of his wife's," said Sarah. "She met 'em over abroad. Real pretty, some of them, ain't they?"