"I--What business is it of yours?" Yvette demanded, angrily. "Who are
you? What are you interfering for?"

"Kind of a habit with me," said Scattergood, "and my wife hain't ever
been able to cure me, even puttin' things in my coffee on the sly....
G'-by, Homer. And don't go lickin' nobody. G'-by."

The habit of obedience to Scattergood's customary dismissal was strong
in Coldriver. For more than a generation the town had been trained to
heed it and to trust its affairs to the old hardware merchant. Homer
hesitated, coughed, mumbled good night to Yvette, and slouched away.

"There," said Scattergood, "now you and me kin talk. We'll go up to your
room, where nobody kin disturb us." The conventions nor the tongue of
gossip was non-existent to Scattergood Baines, and Yvette, not reared in
a school where trust in men is easily learned, was shrewd enough to
recognize Scattergood's purpose and her own safety.

"I s'pose you're the local Mr. Fix-it," she said, with sarcasm.

"I s'pose," said Scattergood, "that I've knowed Homer sence he was knee
high to a mouse's kitten, and I don't know nothin' about you a-tall. I
gather you're calc'latin' on marryin' Homer.... Mebby you be and mebby
you hain't.... Depends. Come along."

He led the way to the hotel and allowed Yvette to precede him up the
stairs to her room, which she unlocked and stood aside for him to enter.
He looked about him in the sharp-eyed way characteristic of him, not
omitting to include in his survey the toilet articles on the dresser.