"Aw, come off! Woman-hater! You hate women same as the boy at the
poorhouse hated ice cream--'cause there ain't none around. Why, I
wouldn't trust you as fur as I could see you!"

This was the end of the dialogue, because Mr. Payne was obliged to break
off his harangue and dodge the stove-lifter flung at him by the outraged
lightkeeper. As the lifter was about to be followed by the teakettle,
Ezra took to his heels, bolted from the house and began his long tramp
to the village. When he reached the first clumps of bayberry bushes
bordering the deeply rutted road, a joyful cloud of mosquitoes rose and
settled about him like a fog.

So Seth Atkins was left alone to do double duty at Eastboro Twin-Lights,
pending the appointment of another assistant. The two days and nights
following Ezra's departure had been strenuous and provoking. Doing
all the housework, preparation of meals included, tending both lights,
rubbing brass work, sweeping and scouring, sleeping when he could and
keeping awake when he must, nobody to talk to, nobody to help--the
forty-eight hours of solitude had already convinced Mr. Atkins that the
sooner a helper was provided the better. At times he even wished the
disrespectful Payne back again, wished that he had soothed instead of
irritated the departed one. Then he remembered certain fragments of
their last conversation and wished the stove-lifter had been flung with
better aim.

Now, standing on the gallery of the south tower, he was conscious of
a desire for breakfast. Preparing that meal had been a part of his
assistant's duties. Now he must prepare it himself, and he was hungry
and sleepy. He mentally vowed that he would no longer delay notifying