“And what did he say?”

“He made more rumpus than ever,” said Florence.  “He went on and on, and told the whole thing over and over again; he seemed like he couldn’t tell it enough, and every time he told it his voice got higher and higher till it was kind of squealy.  He said he’d had his raincoat on and he didn’t want an umberella anyhow, and hadn’t ever carried one a single time in fourteen years!  And he took on about Noble Dill and all this and that about how you bet he knew who it was!  He said he could tell Noble Dill in the dark any time by his cigarette smell, and, anyway, it wasn’t too dark so’s he couldn’t see his skimpy little shoulders, and anyway he saw his face.  And he said Noble didn’t hand him the umberella; he stuck it all down over him like he was somep’n on fire he wanted to put out; and before he could get out of it and throw it away this ole fat man that it belonged to and was chasin’ Noble, he ran up to grandpa from behind and took hold of him, or somep’n, and they slipped, and got to fussin’ against each other; and then after a while they got up and grandpa saw it was somebody he knew and told him for Heaven’s sake why didn’t he take his ole umberella and go on home; and so he did, because it was raining, and I guess he proba’ly had to give up; he couldn’t out-talk grandpa.”

“No,” said Uncle Joe.  “He couldn’t, whoever he was.  But what happened about Noble Dill?”

Florence paused to accumulate and explode a sneeze, then responded pleasantly:  “He said he was goin’ to kill him.  He said he often and often wanted to, and now he was.  That’s the reason I guess Aunt Julia wrote that note this morning.”

“What note?” Aunt Carrie inquired.  “You haven’t told us of that.”

“I was over there before noon,” said Florence, “and Aunt Julia gave me a quarter and said she’d write a note for me to take to Noble Dill’s house when he came home for lunch, and give it to him.  She kind of slipped it to me, because grandpa came in there, pokin’ around, while she was just finishin’ writin’ it.  She didn’t put any envelope on it even, and she never said a single thing to me about its bein’ private or my not readin’ it if I wanted to, or anything.”

“Of course you didn’t,” said Aunt Carrie.  “You didn’t, did you, Florence?”

“Why, she didn’t say not to,” Florence protested, surprised.  “It wasn’t even in an envelope.”

Mr. Joseph Atwater coughed.  “I hardly think we ought to ask what the note said, even if Florence was—­well, indiscreet enough to read it.”

“No,” said his wife.  “I hardly think so either.  It didn’t say anything important anyhow, probably.”

“It began, ‘Dear Noble,’” said Florence promptly.  “Dear Noble’; that’s the way it began.  It said how grandpa was just all upset to think he’d accepted an umberella from him when Noble didn’t have another one for himself like that, and grandpa was so embarrassed to think he’d let Noble do so much for him, and everything, he just didn’t know what to do, and proba’ly it would be tactful if he wouldn’t come to the house till grandpa got over being embarrassed and everything.  She said not to come till she let him know.”