Her clasped fingers tightened and the tears sprang to her eyes.  Poor Jed’s distress was greater than ever.

“Now—­now, Mrs. Armstrong,” he stammered, “all I meant to say was that you mustn’t feel you’ve got to tell me.  Course if you want to, that’s different altogether.  What I’m tryin’ to say,” he added, with a desperate attempt to make his meaning perfectly clear, “is not to pay any attention to me at all but do just what you want to, that’s all.”

Even on the verge of tears as she was, she could not forbear smiling a little at this proclamation of complete self-effacement.  “I fear I must pay some attention to you,” she said, “if I am to confide in you and—­and perhaps ask your help, your advice, afterwards.  I have reached a point when I must ask some one’s advice; I have thought myself into a maze and I don’t know what to do—­I don’t know what to do.  I have no near relatives, no friends here in Orham—­”

Jed held up a protesting hand.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Armstrong,” he stammered; “I don’t know as you recollect, probably it might not have meant as much to you as it did to me; but a spell ago you said somethin’ about countin’ me as a friend.”

“I know I did.  And I meant it.  You have been very kind, and Barbara is so fond of you. . . .  Well, perhaps you can advise me, at least you can suggest—­or—­or—­help me to think.  Will you?”

Jed passed his hand across his chin.  It was obvious that her asking his counsel was simply a last resort, a desperate, forlorn hope.  She had no real confidence in his ability to help.  He would have been the last to blame her for this; her estimate of his capabilities was like his own, that was all.

“W-e-e-ll,” he observed, slowly, “as to givin’ my advice, when a man’s asked to give away somethin’ that’s worth nothin’ the least he can do is say yes and try to look generous, I cal’late.  If I can advise you any, why, I’ll feel proud, of course.”

“Thank you.  Mr. Winslow, for the past two years or more I have been in great trouble.  I have a brother—­but you knew that; Babbie told you.”

“Um-hm.  The one she calls ’Uncle Charlie’?”

“Yes.  He is—­he is serving his sentence in the Connecticut State Prison.”

Jed leaned back upon the box.  His head struck smartly against the edge of the bandsaw bench, but he did not seem to be aware of the fact.

“My Lord above!” he gasped.

“Yes, it is true.  Surely you must have guessed something of that sort, after Babbie’s story of the policemen.”

“I—­I—­well, I did sort of—­of presume likely he must have got into some sort of—­of difficulty, but I never thought ’twas bad as that. . . .  Dear me! . . .  Dear me!”