“What I mean is, it ain’t forty-five and half of forty-five.  Half of one, eh?  That’s identical with a fraction.  One—­a stroke—­and two under it.”

“You’ve got it correct,” Anthony assented.

“How many thousand divide it by?”

“Divide what by, brother William John?  I’m beat.”

“Ah! out comes the keys:  lockup everything; it’s time!” the farmer laughed, rather proud of his brother-in-law’s perfect wakefulness after two stiff tumblers.  He saw that Anthony was determined with all due friendly feeling to let no one know the sum in his possession.

“If it’s four o’clock, it is time to lock up,” said Anthony, “and bang to go the doors, and there’s the money for thieves to dream of—­they can’t get a-nigh it, let them dream as they like.  What’s the hour, ma’am?”

“Not three, it ain’t,” returned Mrs. Sumfit; “and do be good creatures, and begin about my Dahly, and where she got that Bumptious gownd, and the bonnet with blue flowers lyin’ by on the table:  now, do!”

Rhoda coughed.

“And she wears lavender gloves like a lady,” Mrs. Sumfit was continuing.

Rhoda stamped on her foot.

“Oh! cruel!” the comfortable old woman snapped in pain, as she applied her hand to the inconsolable fat foot, and nursed it.  “What’s roused ye, you tiger girl?  I shan’t be able to get about, I shan’t, and then who’s to cook for ye all?  For you’re as ignorant as a raw kitchen wench, and knows nothing.”

“Come, Dody, you’re careless,” the farmer spoke chidingly through Mrs. Sumfit’s lamentations.

“She stops uncle Anthony when he’s just ready, father,” said Rhoda.

“Do you want to know?” Anthony set his small eyes on her:  “do you want to know, my dear?” He paused, fingering his glass, and went on:  “I, Susan, take thee, William John, and you’ve come of it.  Says I to myself, when I hung sheepish by your mother and by your father, my dear, says I to myself, I ain’t a marrying man:  and if these two, says I, if any progeny comes to ’em—­to bless them, some people’d say, but I know what life is, and what young ones are—­if—­where was I?  Liquor makes you talk, brother William John, but where’s your ideas?  Gone, like hard cash!  What I meant was, I felt I might some day come for’ard and help the issue of your wife’s weddin’, and wasn’t such a shady object among you, after all.  My pipe’s out.”

Rhoda stood up, and filled the pipe, and lit it in silence.  She divined that the old man must be allowed to run on in his own way, and for a long time he rambled, gave a picture of the wedding, and of a robbery of Boyne’s Bank:  the firm of Boyne, Burt, Hamble, and Company.  At last, he touched on Dahlia.