"Well! Call them shoes! My Kitty couldn't get her 'and into 'em! And as for a foot fittin' in! What a foot! It can't be much bigger'n a baby's. Well, well, what a pair o' shoes!" She stood looking at them, a fat smile on her face, and Walden moved uneasily from the threshold. "I'll leave you now, Mrs. Spruce," he said; "You have plenty to do, and I'm in the way here." "Well, now, Passon, that do beat me!" said Mrs. Spruce plaintively; "I thought you was a-goin' to help us!" "Help you? I?" and Walden laughed aloud; "My dear woman, do you think I can unpack and unfold ladies' dresses? Of all the many incongruous uses a clergyman was ever put to, wouldn't that be the most impossible?" "Lord love ye, Passon Walden, I ain't askin' ye no such thing;" retorted Mrs. Spruce; "Don't ye think it! For there's nothin' like a man, passon or no passon, for makin' rumples of every bit of clothes he touches, even his own coats and weskits, and I wouldn't let ye lay hands on any o' these things to save my life. Why, they'd go to pieces at the mere sight of yer fingers, they're so flimsy! What I thought ye might do, was to be a witness to us while we sorted them all. It's a great thing to have a man o' God as a witness to the likes o' this work!" Again Walden laughed, this time with very genuine heartiness, though he did wish Mrs. Spruce would put away the troublesome pink shoes which she still held, and to which he found his eyes still wandering. "Nonsense! You don't want any witness!" he said gaily; "What are you thinking about, Mrs. Spruce? When Miss Vancourt is here, all you have to do is to go over every item of her property with her, and see that she finds it all right. If anything is missing, it's not your fault." "If anythink's missing," echoed Mrs. Spruce in sepulchral tones, "then the Lord knows what we'll do, for it'll be all over, so far as we're consarned! Beggars in the street'll be kings to us. Passon, I reckon ye doesn't read the newspapers much, does ye?" "Pretty fairly," responded Walden still smiling; "I keep myself as well acquainted as I can with what is going on in the world."