“I want nothing to do with you, sir,” he said, less violently, but, as he felt, not more effectually.  “You are in my house without my invitation, and against my wish!”

“I didn’t expect to find you here.  I came in because I saw the door open, and I thought I might see Dick or his wife and give them, this paper for you.  But I’m glad I found you, and if you won’t give me any reason for not wanting me here, I can give it myself, and I think I can make out a very good case for you.”  Kenton quivered in anticipation of some mention of Ellen, and Bittridge smiled as if he understood.  But he went on to say:  “I know that there were things happened after you first gave me the run of your house that might make you want to put up the bars again—­if they were true.  But they were not true.  And I can prove that by the best of all possible witnesses—­by Uphill himself.  He stands shoulder to shoulder with me, to make it hot for any one who couples his wife’s name with mine.”

“Humph!” Kenton could not help making this comment, and Bittridge, being what he was, could not help laughing.

“What’s the use?” he asked, recovering himself.  “I don’t pretend that I did right, but you know there wasn’t any harm in it.  And if there had been I should have got the worst of it.  Honestly, judge, I couldn’t tell you how much I prized being admitted to your house on the terms I was.  Don’t you think I could appreciate the kindness you all showed me?  Before you took me up, I was alone in Tuskingum, but you opened every door in the place for me.  You made it home to me; and you won’t believe it, of course, because you’re prejudiced; but I felt like a son and brother to you all.  I felt towards Mrs. Kenton just as I do towards my own mother.  I lost the best friends I ever had when you turned against me.  Don’t you suppose I’ve seen the difference here in Tuskingum?  Of course, the men pass the time of day with me when we meet, but they don’t look me up, and there are more near-sighted girls in this town!” Kenton could not keep the remote dawn of a smile out of his eyes, and Bittridge caught the far-off gleam.  “And everybody’s been away the whole winter.  Not a soul at home, anywhere, and I had to take my chance of surprising Mrs. Dick Kenton when I saw your door open here.”  He laughed forlornly, as the gleam faded out of Kenton’s eye again.  “And the worst of it is that my own mother isn’t at home to me, figuratively speaking, when I go over to see her at Ballardsville.  She got wind of my misfortune, somehow, and when I made a clean breast of it to her, she said she could never feel the same to me till I had made it all right with the Kentons.  And when a man’s own mother is down on him, judge!”

Bittridge left Kenton to imagine the desperate case, and in spite of his disbelief in the man and all he said, Kenton could not keep his hardness of heart towards him.  “I don’t know what you’re after, young man,” he began.  “But if you expect me to receive you under my roof again—­”