"Wasn't it!" she agreed, cheerfully. "And he
trusted the Judge absolutely. I don't, you see."

He gave her a thoughtful look and nodded.
"No, he isn't a good man," he said, "not even
according to his lights; but I doubt if he could have
managed to get away with anything of consequence
after he became the administrator. He
wouldn't have tried it, probably, unless he was
more desperately pushed than I think he has been.
It would have been too dangerous. Suppose you
wait a week or so and think it over."

"But there's something I want you to do for me
immediately, Joe."

"What's that?"

"I want the old house put in order. I'm going
to live there."

"Alone?"

"I'm almost twenty-seven, and that's being
enough of an old maid for me to risk Canaan's
thinking me eccentric, isn't it?"

"It will think anything you do is all right."

"And once," she cried, "it thought everything