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She looked at it for a long minute, and then said gaily to Miss Larrabee: "He was a handsome boy quite the beau of the State when we were married Judge of the District Court at twenty-four." She held the case in her hand and went on opening the others. She came to one showing a moustached and goateed youth in a captain's uniform a slim, straight, soldierly figure.
Of course at the office we have known for twenty-five years what the men thought of Mortimer, but not until Miss Larrabee joined the force did we know that among the women Mrs. Conklin was considered an oracle.
I followed them, and they went round and round the house two or three times, ez ef they mout hev bin prowlin', and then I lost 'em in the woods again. It's just like that sneakin' hound Larrabee to hev bin lyin' in wait for me and afraid to meet a man fair and square in the open."
"I'd be much obleeged to you, Captain Fishley, if you'd do it," said Miss Larrabee, delighted with the suggestion. "I shan't be gone more'n a month, and when I come back I'll hand it to you. That letter must come to-day or to-morrow, and if you have a mind to, you can open it, and take the money out. It will save me the interest."
Them mail folks ought to look out for things better'n that." "If it didn't come, it didn't," added Ham, consolingly. "But I know it did come. Ethan must have put it in the post-office. 'Tain't like him to say he'd do a thing, and then not do it. I almost know he sent the letter." At this point Captain Fishley and his brother entered the store, and Miss Larrabee appealed to him.
I saw through the mill-stone. The postmaster had heard from Miss Larrabee, or her brother, in regard to the missing letter, and I was accused of purloining it! No doubt Captain Fishley thought I was the robber. Probably Ham had charged the crime upon me, and his father was willing to believe him. "I have not robbed the mail," I replied, smartly. "Yes, you did; and I can prove it.
At first, say for six months after she came to the office, Miss Larrabee devoted herself to the accumulation of professional pride. This pride was as much a part of her life as her pompadour, which at that time was so high that she had to tiptoe to reach it. However she managed to keep it up was the wonder of the office. Finally, we all agreed that she must use chicken-fence.
"It may come up to-night, as you say, and I will be down again in the morning to see about it," replied Miss Larrabee, as she left the store, hopeful that the money would arrive in season to enable her to depart the next day on her journey. I finished blacking Ham's boots, and he put them on.
The talk drifted back to the old days, and Aunt Martha got out her photograph-album and showed Miss Larrabee the pictures of those whom she called "the rude forefathers of the village," in their quaint old costumes of war-times. In the book were baby pictures of middle-aged men and women, and youthful pictures of the old men and women of the town.
He told me all about it," cried Dick. "Say," he declared, "I dunno 's I ever see the old man more kind o' womble-cropped over anythin'. Why, he wouldn't no more 'a' passed them bills 'n he'd 'a' cut his hand off. He, he, he, he! He was jest ticklin' your heels a little," said Mr. Larrabee, "to see if you'd kick, an'," chuckled the speaker, "you surely did."
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