anything. Of course, bein' a widder, Miss Plank felt more hampered.

And he wuz good to me in other ways, besides easin' my cares and nerves
at the table.

His rooms wuz jest acrost the hall from ourn, and my Josiah's and my
room wuz very small; it wuz the best that Miss Plank could do, so I
didn't complain. But it wuz very compressed and confined, and extremely
hot.

When we wuz both in there sometimes on sultry days, I felt like
compressed meat, or as I mistrusted that would feel, sort o' canned up,
as it were.

And one warm afternoon, 'most sundown, jest as I opened my door into the
hall, to see if I could git a breath of fresh air to recooperate me,
Josiah a-pantin' in the rockin'-chair behind me, Mr. Freeman opened his
door, and so there we wuz a-facin' each other.

[Illustration: And so there we wuz a-facin' each other.]

And bein' sort o' took by surprise, I made the observation that "I wuz
jest about melted, and so wuz my Josiah, and my room wuz like a dry oven
and a tin can."

I wouldn't have said it if I hadn't been so sort o' flustrated, and by
the side of myself.

And he jest swung open his door into a big cool parlor, and I could see
beyend the doors open into two or three other handsome rooms.