He is young, and Bermuda Ray says he is in love with Callie Payne, who
lives just down the street. He has to pass her house going home, and I
guess that's the reason he wore his good clothes and took them off so
carefully. But whether that was it or not, he was the rippenest, maddest
man I ever saw in my life when he went to put on his pants and there
were none to put.

I almost rolled off the porch up-stairs, where I was watching. I never
did know before how much a man thinks of his pants.

He soon had Miss Bray and Miss Jones and a lot of the girls out in the
yard, and everybody was talking at once; and then I heard him say:

"But I tell you, Miss Bray, I put 'em here, right on this woodpile. And
where are they? You run this place, and you are responsible for--"

"Not for pants." And Miss Bray's voice was so shrill it sounded like a
broken whistle. "I'm responsible for no man's pants. When a man can't
take care of his pants, he shouldn't have them. Besides, you shouldn't
have left yours in the woodhouse when working in a Female Orphan
Asylum." And she glared so at him that the poor male thing withered, and
blushed real beautiful.

He's a pretty young man, and I felt sorry for him when Miss Bray snapped
so. I certainly did.

"My overalls are my working-pants," he said, real meek-like, and his
voice was trembling so I thought he was going to cry. "It's very strange
that in a place like this a man's clothes are not safe. I thought--"