I realized then that I should have taken the poker.  I went over cautiously to one of the windows, wading in deep snow to get there—­and if you have ever done that in a pair of bedroom slippers you can realize the state of my mind—­and looked in.

There were three chairs drawn up in a row in front of the fire, with my bearskin hearth-rug on them to make a couch, and my shepherd’s plaid shawl folded at one end for a pillow.  And stretched on that with her long sealskin coat laid over her was Dorothy Jennings, Miss Patty’s younger sister!  She was alone, as far as I could see, and she was leaning on her elbow with her cheek in her hand, staring at the fire.  Just then the door into the pantry opened and out came Mr. Dick himself.

“Were you calling, honey?” he said, coming over and looking down at her.

“You were such a long time!” says she, glancing up under her lashes at him.  “I—­I was lonely!”

“Bless you,” says Mr. Dick, stooping over her.  “What did I ever do without you?”

I could have told her a few things he did, but by that time it was coming over me pretty strong that here was the real Dicky Carter and that I had an extra one on my hands.  The minute I looked at this one I knew that nobody but a blind man would mistake one for the other, and Mr. Thoburn wasn’t blind.  I tell you I stood out in that snow-bank and perspired!

When I looked again Mr. Dick was on his knees by the row of chairs, and Miss Dorothy—­Mrs. Dicky, of course—­was running her fingers through his hair.

“Minnie used to keep apples and things in the pantry,” he said, “but she must be growing stingy in her old age; there’s not a bite there.”

“I’m not so very hungry when I have you!” cooed Mrs. Dicky.

“But you can’t eat me.”  He brought her hand down from his hair—­I may be stingy in my old age, but I’ve learned a few things, and one is that a man feels like a fool with his hair rumpled, and I can tell the degree of a woman’s experience by the way she lets his top hair alone—­and pretended to bite it, her hand, of course.  “Although I could eat you,” he said.  “I’d like to take a bite out of your throat right there.”

Well, it was no place for me unless they knew I was around.  I waded around to the door and walked in, and there was a grand upsetting of the sealskin coat and my shepherd’s plaid shawl.  Mr. Dick jumped to his feet and Mrs. Dick sat bolt upright and stared at me over the backs of the chairs.

“Minnie!” cried Mr. Dick.  “As I’m a married man, it’s Minnie herself; Minnie, the guardian angel!  The spirit of the place!  Dorothy, don’t you remember Minnie?”

She came toward me with her hand out.  She was a pretty little thing, not so beautiful as Miss Patty, but with a nice way about her.

“I’m awfully glad to see you again,” she said.  “Of course I remember—­why you are hardly dressed at all!  You must be frozen!”