Mr. Lindsay laughed, but his laugh did not sound quite natural, and he followed his friends to the house in a state of growing anger toward Mr. Brock and one other to whom his suspicions most strongly pointed, his whilom friend, Mrs. Doggett. Gran'dad sat propped up in a chair, with pillows, slightly pale from the effects of a fall he had suffered the day before,--a fall that in no wise had affected his tongue. "Well, Lindsay," he grinned, "I hear love-letters air so common with ye, you throw 'em down in the highway!" Mr. Lindsay frowned heavily. "I never have throwed one in the road yit, and whoever says I did--" "He belongs in the company o' them that 'shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone,'" quoted Gran'dad, interrupting him. "Hit don't seem to me that tellin' a leetle made up tale to holp hisse'f along in courtin' would be accounted a crime on a feller," proffered his son. "Mebbe the feller that's done hit wouldn't be accounted guilty of crime in the Courts, Ephriam," sagely observed Gran'dad, "but he ort to be in the pen on gineral principles anyhow!" "Ef hit's Mr. Brock you're a hintin' on," said Mrs. Doggett, "I've got this to tell you: anybody that says a word ag'in Galvin Brock, may eat dough that passes through my fingers, but he hain't no ways _welcome_ to hit!" She spoke lightly, but the spark in her eyes belied the lightness of her tones. Mr. Lindsay rose, and with the remark that it was time all respectable people had on their Sunday clothes, went upstairs where his wardrobe was kept. Dunaway and Dock followed him. When they came down they announced that the three of them were going to Jim and Henrietty's to spend the day. "What wuz that you throwed out the winder, Dock, jest before you come down?" queried his grandfather who sat facing the front window. "Hit fell in that yaller rosey-bush." "Jes' my dirty clothes, Gran'dad," answered Dock, cheerfully, going out to rescue the bundle. "Bein's the boys is all gone, Mr. Lindsay," Mr. Doggett reached for his hat,--"and Dad liable to be a nappin', I'll git sorter lonesome. I believe I'll jest step up to old man Jeemeses as you all go, fer a few minutes, and see how he is." Dock and Dunaway had disappeared, but just before the older men came in sight of the James house, they joined them, Dunaway clothed in the shirt-waist costume of the Sunday before. Mr. Doggett gazed at Dunaway in his stylish habiliments, and opened his mouth for remark, but thoughtfully and considerately closed it again. "I guess I'll have to leave you here," said Mr. Doggett, lifting the latch of the gate in the high picket fence that ran along the back of the James garden and orchard. Mr. Lindsay laid a detaining hand on Mr. Doggett's shoulder. "Think you could talk to the old man and keep him settin' still there on the back porch fer an hour er so, Uncle Eph?"