Kyan stepped from the chair and moved the latter to a position between the high-boy and the wall.  Then he remounted and gripped the pipe in the middle of its horizontal section.

“Seems to stick in the chimney there, don’t it?” queried Keziah.  “Wiggle it back and forth; that ought to loosen it.  What was it you wanted to say, ’Bish?”

Apparently, Mr. Pepper had nothing to say.  The crimson tide had reached his ears, which, always noticeable because of their size and spread, were now lit up like a schooner’s sails at sunset.  His hands trembled on the pipe.

“Nothin’, nothin’, I tell you,” he faltered.  “I—­I just run in to say how d’ye do, that’s all.”

“Really, I think I’d better be going,” said Grace, glancing from Kyan’s embarrassed face to that of the unsuspecting Mrs. Coffin.  “I’m afraid I’m in the way.”

“No, no!” shouted the occupant of the chair.  “No, no, you ain’t!”

“But I’m afraid I am.  And they’ll be expecting me at home.  Aunt Keziah, I—­”

“Don’t be in such a hurry,” interrupted Keziah.  “Does stick in the chimney, don’t it?  Tell you what you can do, Grace; you can go in the woodshed and fetch the hammer that’s in the table drawer.  Hurry up, that’s a good girl.”

Kyan protested that he did not need the hammer, but his protest was unheeded.  With one more glance at the couple, Grace departed from the kitchen, biting her lips.  She shut the door carefully behind her.  Mr. Pepper labored frantically with the pipe.

“No use to shake it any more till you get the hammer,” advised Keziah.  “Might’s well talk while you’re waitin’.  What was it you wanted to tell me?”

Abishai drew one hand across his forehead, leaving a decorative smooch of blacking on his perspiring countenance.  He choked, swallowed, and then, with a look at the closed door, seemed to reach a desperate resolve.

“Keziah,” he whispered hurriedly, “you’ve known me quite a spell, ain’t you?”

“Known you?  Known you ever since you were born, pretty nigh.  What of it?”

“Yes, yes.  And I’ve known you, you know.  Fact is, we’ve known each other.”

“Hear the man!  Land sakes! don’t everybody in Trumet know everybody else?  What are you drivin’ at?”

“Keziah, you’re a single woman.”

His companion let go of the chair, which she had been holding in place, and stepped back.

“I’m a single woman?” she repeated sharply.  “What do you mean by that?  Did—­did anybody say I wasn’t?”

“No, no!  ’Course not.  But you’re a widow, so you be single, you know, and—­”

“Well?  Did you think I was twins?  Get down off there this minute.  You’ve gone crazy.  I thought so when I saw that beaver.  Either that or you’ve been drinkin’.  Grace!  What does make her so long gettin’ that hammer?”

Finding the hammer did seem to take a long time.  There was no sound from the kitchen.  Kyan, steadying himself with one hand on the pipe, waved the other wildly.