"Why, I never thought to ask Mr. Bliss how Mr. Homer was, and he just the one to tell us. Now did you ever! Fact is, when he come in, I hadn't got my face straight after that woman askin' for mesmerized petticoats. I was shakin' still when I see Mr. Bliss comin', and my wits flew every which way like a scairt hen. But speakin' of petticoats reminds me, Tommy Candy was in this mornin' while you was to market, and _he_ said Mr. Homer was re'l slim. 'Pestered with petticoats' was what he said, and I said, 'What do you mean, Tommy Candy?' and he said, 'Just what I say, Miss Penny,' he said. 'I guess you and Miss Prudence are the only single or widder women in Quahaug that ain't settin' their caps for Mr. Homer,' he said. And I said, 'Tommy Candy, that's no way for you to talk, if you _have_ had money left you!' I said. He said he knew it wasn't, but yet he couldn't help it, and you and I had always ben good to him sence his mother died. He has a good heart, Tommy has, only he doos speak up so queer, and love mischief. But he says it's a fact, they do pester Mr. Homer, Sister. There! it made me feel fairly ashamed. 'Don't tell me Miss Bethia Wax is one of 'em,' I said, 'because I shouldn't believe you if you did,' I said. 'Well, I won't,' he said, 'for she ain't; she's a lady.' But some, he said, was awful, and he means to stand between; he don't intend Mr. Homer should marry anybody except he wants to, and it's the right one. Seemed to have re'l good _i_deas, and he thinks the world of Mr. Homer. I like Tommy; he has a re'l pleasant way with him." "You'd make cream cheese out of 'most any skim-milk, Sister," said Miss Prudence, kindly. "Not but what Tommy has improved a vast deal to what he was. It's his lameness, I expect." "That's right!" cried little Miss Penny, the tears starting to her round brown eyes. "That's it, Sister, and that's what turns my heart to the boy, I expect. So young, and to be lame for life; it is pitiful." "He did what he had a mind to do," said Miss Prudence, grimly. "He had no call to climb that steeple, as I know of." "Oh, Sister, there's so many that has no call to do _as_ they do, and yet many times they don't seem to get their come-uppance, far as we can see; I expect they do, though, come to take it in the yard _or_ the piece. But, howsoever, Mis' Tree has done handsome by Tommy, and he has a grateful heart, and means to do his part by Mr. Homer and the _Mu_seum, I feel sure of that. Sister, do you suppose Pindar Hollopeter is alive? Seem's though if he was, he'd come home now, at least for a spell: Homer in affliction, as you may say, and left with means and all. How long is it since he went away?" "Thirty years," said Miss Prudence. "I always thought it was a good riddance to bad rubbidge when Pindar went away." "Why, Sister, he was an elegant man, flighty, but re'l elegant; at least, so he appeared to me; I was a child then. Why did he go, Sister? I never rightly understood about it."