“Yes, I have trusted Sime,” he would mumble aloud, after he had stared at the corner of the alders until his eye ached. “I’ve trusted him, I say! But when your old neighbours and your own brother skins you, then it’s time to turn to strangers and get used white. It’s your own folks that do you the wust--it allus has been so, it prob’ly allus will be so. But---I could go to the shire and ’tend to that bus’ness and crawl back on my hands and knees before this. She was a-goin’ to telegraft for them letters, cuss her!” On the third day, when “Figger-Four” Avery bobbed back from the post-office with the mail, there was a thick packet among the letters that Hiram opened first with trembling fingers, for he had recognised Simon Peak’s handwriting. It was the letter wrapped around the bankbook that Hiram tackled first. He skimmed it with his one eye bulging like a rabbit’s. It was in a way an apologetic letter, and yet it was flavoured with a note of complaint. Simon Peak went on to state that he had thought it all over prayerfully. Each time that a woman had come into their affairs he had been misjudged. Now that his suspicions as to the up-country widow had been confirmed, he could plainly see that he would sooner or later be misjudged again and, being old, he could not endure any more griefs of the sort, seeing that Hiram was his best and his only friend. He was too tender-hearted to stand it--and, besides, he had heard that the widow was neater than wax and smarter than a hornet, and under her administration spittoons and general freedom would have to be abandoned. Moreover, he believed that the conscience of Signora Rosyelli had troubled her ever since the episode of the sixteen hundred dollars. Furthermore, letting her have all that money to go away with and do with as she liked wouldn’t be the retribution that she deserved. It was too much money for a woman to handle---- Hiram yanked open the bankbook and glared at the balance. There had been a withdrawal of ten thousand dollars. In the more crucial moments of his life Hiram Look had frequently refrained from anathema. Some situations were made too matter-of-fact by cursing. Now he stood up, shoved his arms above his head, gulped a half a dozen times, blew out his breath with a “Poof!” and sat down again. After wiping his forehead with the flat of his hand he went on with the letter.