"And that lazy, gossiping crowd of worthless men folks was just killing themselves laughing and making fun of poor Uncle Tony, sitting right in his very own chairs and warming their lazy feet at his comfortable fire. Uncle Tony happened to be out and those loafers just started in and what they said about that kind old man made my blood boil. They were all mean enough, with Seth egging them on every now and then about that dime that he was cheated out of. But Mert Hagley was the worst. Of course, everybody knows Mert's just dying to hog Uncle Tony's business along with his shop, as if the stingy thing wasn't rich enough already. Well, when Mert heard about that ten-cent mistake he said it was about time there were a few business changes in Green Valley, that a few business funerals would help a lot and freshen up things; that Uncle Tony was no business man, and a lot of that sort of stuff. And of course Hughey Mason, being a smart Aleck, pipes up and says, 'That's so, Uncle Tony is no business man. Why, Tom Hall says that when you find Uncle Tony's emporium locked at eleven o'clock of a winter morning you can bet your bottom dollar Uncle Tony's home shaking down the furnace, and if it's closed at four of a summer afternoon Uncle Tony's sneaked off home to mow the lawn.' "Well, those idiots and old hypocrites were talking just like that, goodness knows how long. They never took the trouble to see if Uncle Tony was really around or not. But all of a sudden I looked around the corner of the middle row of shelves and there was that poor old man sitting as still as death in his cashier's cage and looking sick to death. You know he wouldn't cheat a soul, and as for that store, he'd die without it. It's all the family he has. Well I had stepped in there to buy a couple of flat-irons. The children mislaid mine. But I walked right out for I didn't want to call him out to wait on me. "I was so mad I just walked around the block till I met Mrs. Jerry Dustin right at Simpson's corner and I told her the whole thing. She was as hurt about it as Uncle Tony and kept holding on to Simpson's garden fence and saying, 'Dear me, Fanny, we must do something. I have a message for Tony, anyway, and this is just the time to deliver it.' "So back we went and we met Uncle Tony stepping in at the front door too. He must have sneaked out the back way and come around the front so's not to let on he'd heard anything. He was kind of white and miserable about the mouth and his eyes looked out kind of blind. But he smiled when Mrs. Jerry Dustin said, 'Good morning, Tony.' I wonder," Fanny digressed, "if it's true that Uncle Tony wanted to marry Mrs. Dustin once. Sadie Dundry says so but you know how unreliable Sadie is about what she knows.