"Then I suppose we'll have to stand it," sighed Mr. Huntington, "but it seems decidedly unfortunate that when ninety-nine school-ma'ams out of a hundred have _some_ measure of attractiveness, you should have chosen the hundredth." Perhaps Mr. Huntington might have made some further effort toward dislodging Miss Turner; but shortly after the foregoing conversation, he was again taken ill. For more than a week he had been kept in bed and James had said something to the cook about "a slight stroke." But to Jeanne's great relief this illness was of shorter duration than the preceding one. He was up again; and spending his waking hours in a wheeled chair under the big elm in the garden. Jeanne, however, could see that he was not so well. His eyes had lost some of their keenness, and often the word that he wanted would not come. He seemed quite a good many years older; and not nearly so vigorous as he had been before this new illness. Jeanne hovered over him anxiously. Sometimes Mrs. Huntington told visitors that she feared that her father-in-law's faculties were becoming sadly impaired. "He seems to dislike me," she added, plaintively, when she mentioned "impaired faculties" to her husband. James overheard this. Indeed, James was _always_ overhearing things not meant for his too-receptive ears, because he was so much a part of the furniture that no one ever remembered that he was in the room or gave him credit for being human. James told Bridget about it. "The old gentleman," said he, "nor anybody else doesn't need impaired faculties to dislike _that_ lady. If she's got any real feelings inside her they're cased up in asbestos, like the pipes to the furnace. They never comes out. She's a human icicle, she is. I declare, if she'd get real mad just once and sling the soup tureen at me, I'd take the scalding gladly and say, 'Thank you kindly, ma'am; 'tis a pleasure to see you thawing, just for once.'" James, you have noticed, was much more human in the kitchen than he was in the dining-room. Mrs. Huntington, who had lived under the same roof with him for many years, would certainly have been surprised if she had heard him, for in her presence James was like a talking doll, in that he had just two set speeches. They were, "Yes, ma'am" and "No, ma'am." "She's padded with her own conceit," said Bridget, "and there's a cast-iron crust outside that. She shows no affection for her own children, let alone that motherless lamb." "If she ever swallowed her pride," said Maggie, "'twould choke her." "Then I hope she does it," said James, going meekly to the front of the house to say "Yes, ma'am" and "No, ma'am" to his frigid mistress. For if James were more talkative in the kitchen than he was in the dining-room he was also much braver. CHAPTER XVIII A THUNDERBOLT