"Why bless my soul!" blustered Mr. Reynolds, his face a fine glowing
color; "bless my soul!" he repeated, removing his shoes and slamming
them down, as he always did under stress. "Women, my dear, will make up
all sorts of stories. If I did give the door a bit of a slam, it was
because the bacon didn't set right, perhaps. And a woman's always
fancying things."

"But you don't put your arm about her, you know that, Reynolds. I was
born in this town and I've never seen you put your arm about her."

Mrs. Reynolds' apron was over her head again, but she made no sound. Her
husband knocked the ashes from his pipe, and ran his fingers through his
thick hair. Then he stared helplessly at Suzanna. She rose valiantly to
the occasion.

"If you say, 'There, there, don't cry, you should have married a better
man,' she'll say: 'There couldn't be a better' and take her apron down."
Thus innocently Suzanna exposed a tender home method of salving hurts,
and her listener, as near as his nature could, appropriated the method.
He rose from his chair and went softly to his wife. At her side he
hesitated in sheer embarrassment, but as she began to sob, he hurriedly
repeated Suzanna's formula: "There, there, dear, don't cry. I'm a bad
'un, I am--"

Mrs. Reynolds lowered her shield. "You know better than that,
Reynolds," she denied, almost indignantly. "You're a good provider, with
a bit of a temper."

"Well, out with it then. What _is_ the trouble? I'm willing to do what I
can, even occasionally to doing what the little lass suggests." And with