Mr. Powless did not comply.  He said “Umph” and that was all.

“George,” repeated Mrs. Powless, “do you hear me?  Come and look at them.”

And George came.  One might have inferred that, when his wife spoke like that, he usually came.  He treated a wooden porpoise to a thoroughly wooden stare and repeated his remark of “Umph!”

“Aren’t they extraordinary!” exclaimed his wife.  “Does this man make them himself, I wonder?”

She seemed to be addressing her husband, so Jed did not answer.

“Do you?” demanded Mr. Powless.

“Yes,” replied Jed.

Mrs. Powless said “Fancy!” Mr. Powless strolled back to the window.

“This view is all right, Mollie,” he observed.  “Better even than it is from the street.  Come and see.”

Mrs. Powless went and saw.  Jed stood still and stared miserably.

“Rather attractive, on the whole, don’t you think, dear?” inquired the gentleman.  “Must be very decent in the yard there.”

The lady did not reply, but she opened the door and went out, around the corner of the shop and into the back yard.  Her husband trotted after her.  The owner of the property, gazing pathetically through the window, saw them wandering about the premises, looking off at the view, up into the trees, and finally trying the door of the old house and peeping in between the slats of the closed blinds.  Then they came strolling back to the shop.  Jed, drawing a long breath, prepared to face the ordeal.

Mrs. Powless entered the shop.  Mr. Powless remained by the door.  He spoke first.

“You own all this?” he asked, indicating the surrounding country with a wave of his cane.  Jed nodded.

“That house, too?” waving the point of the cane toward the Winslow cottage.

“Yes.”

“How old is it?”

Jed stammered that he guessed likely it was about a hundred years old or such matter.

“Umph!  Furniture old, too?”

“Yes, I cal’late most of it is.”

“Nobody living in it?”

“No-o.”

“Got the key to it?”

Here was the question direct.  If he answered in the affirmative the next utterance of the Powless man would be a command to be shown the interior of the house.  Jed was certain of it, he could see it in the man’s eye.  What was infinitely more important, he could see it in the lady’s eye.  He hesitated.

“Got the key to it?” repeated Mr. Powless.

Jed swallowed.

“No-o,” he faltered, “I—­I guess not.”

“You guess not.  Don’t you know whether you’ve got it or not?”

“No.  I mean yes.  I know I ain’t.”

“Where is it; lost?”

The key was usually lost, that is to say, Jed was accustomed to hunt for fifteen minutes before finding it, so, his conscience backing his inclination, he replied that he cal’lated it must be.