Kenelm hesitated.  He seemed to find it difficult to answer.

“Why—­why—­” he stammered, “I’d been up to the office after the mail.  And—­and—­it was so late comin’ that I give it up.  I says to Lemuel Ryder, ‘Lem,’ I says—­”

His sister broke in.

“Lem Ryder!” she repeated.  “Was he at the post-office?”

“Well—­well—­” Kenelm’s confusion was more marked than ever.  “Well—­well—­” he stammered, “I see him, and I says—­”

“You see him!  Where did you see him?  Kenelm Parker, I don’t believe you was at the postoffice at all.  You was at the clubroom, that’s where you was.  At that clubroom, smokin’ and playin’ cards with that deprivated crowd of loafers and gamblers.  Tell me the truth, now, wasn’t you?”

Mr. Parker’s tie fell off then, but neither he nor his sister noticed it.

“Gamblers!” he snorted.  “There ain’t no gamblers there.  Playin’ a hand or two of Californy Jack just for fun ain’t gamblin’.  I wouldn’t gamble, not for a million dollars.”

Captain Obed laughed.  “Neither would I,” he observed.  “Nor for two cents, with that clubroom gang; ’twould be too much nerve strain collectin’ my winnin’s.  I see now why you come by the Barnes’ house, Kenelm.  It’s the nighest way home from that clubhouse.  Well, I’m glad you did.  Mrs. Barnes and Miss Howes would have had a long session in the dark if you hadn’t.  Yes, and a night at Darius Holt’s hotel, which would have been a heap worse.  So you’ve been livin’ at South Middleboro, Mrs. Barnes, have you?  Does Miss Howes live there, too?”

Thankful, very grateful for the change of topic, told of her life since her husband’s death, of her long stay with Mrs. Pearson, of Emily’s teaching school, and their trip aboard the depot-wagon.

“Well,” exclaimed Miss Parker, when she had finished, “you have been through enough, I should say!  A reg’lar story-book adventure, ain’t it?  Lost in a storm and shut up in an empty house, the one you come purpose to see.  It’s a mercy you wa’n’t either of you hurt, climbin’ in that window the way you did.  You might have broke your arms or your necks or somethin’.  Mr. Alpheus Bassett, down to the Point—­a great, strong, fleshy man, weighs close to two hundred and fifty and never sick a day in his life—­he was up in the second story of his buildin’ walkin’ around spry as anybody—­all alone, which he shouldn’t have been at his age—­and he stepped on a fish and away he went.  And the next thing we hear he’s in bed with his collar-bone.  Did you ever hear anything like that in your life, Miss Howes?”

It was plain that Emily never had.  “I—­I’m afraid I don’t understand,” she faltered.  “You say he was in the second story of a building and he stepped on—­on a fish?”

“Yes, just a mackerel ’twas, and not a very big one, they tell me.  At first they was afraid ’twas the spine he’d broke, but it turned out to be only the collar-bone, though that’s bad enough.”