“I could see him as plain as anything, Hugh.  He’d listen a bit, and then just as like as not hear something that tickled him a heap, for he’d double up and seem to just shake with silent laughter.  Oh!  I was just burning like fun, and boiling over, I was so mad to see how he carried on; because I just knew Matilda was holding the fort against all the batteries the three ladies could bring to bear, and telling them that it was her sacred duty to take care of her poor, poor brother in his last sickness, because the rough world had used him so harshly.

“Well, in the end he crawled away in a big hurry, so I knew the three ladies must be coming out.  Sure enough they came in sight, and both Mrs. Lund and Miss Carpenter were looking as though they felt highly indignant because Matilda she chose to stick by her good-for-nothing brother, even when they told her they could hardly be expected to go to the trouble to furnish sewing just to help feed such a lazy-looking man, and keep him in smoking tobacco.  Ma, she seemed dreadfully hurt, and I guess she hardly knew what to do, for she thinks a heap of Matilda and Mr. Hosmer.

“They went away, and Matilda, she stood there and looked after them sort of sad like.  She knew she had offended three of her best friends, and it cut her to the quick.  Still, I could see from her face that she didn’t mean to turn on Brother Lu, and tell him he’d have to clear out; for she gave her head a stubborn little flirt as she turned and went indoors again.

“Hugh, this thing is really getting serious, seems to me.  If those ladies think it their duty to quit giving Matilda work the poor things will starve, because all they’ve got to depend on now is what she earns by her needle.  Something ought to be done to rid her of that wart that’s fastened on her bounty; if she won’t give him up of her own will, then some of us ought to see to it that he’s chased out of the neighborhood.”

“Hold on, Thad, go slow,” warned the more cautious Hugh.  “I feel pretty much the same as you do about it, but we mustn’t think of trying any White Cap business around such a respectable town as Scranton.  There’s still lots of time to investigate; and if the worst comes we can appeal to the mayor to help.  Perhaps the police could look up the man’s record, and make him clear out on the plea that he’s got a bad reputation.  That would answer our purpose, and at the same time keep within the law.”

Thad looked wonderfully pleased.

“I didn’t tell you something more I saw, Hugh,” he now went on to say.  “When the three ladies came out, Brother Lu he managed to be there in plain sight.  He tried to be polite like, and was of course seized with one of those fake fits of coughing right before them.  Matilda ran to his side, and put her arm around him looking defiantly at Ma as if to say:  ’There, don’t you see how far gone he is, and how can you ask me to be so inhuman and unsisterly as to tell him he must go out again into the cold, cruel world that has treated him so badly?’