length, feeling that anything would be more bearable than this silence, I
turned to him.

"'Things have not been going well with you, I'm afraid, Josiah?' I said.

"'No, sir,' he replied quietly; 'I can't say as they have, altogether.
That Hannah of yours has turned out a bit of a teaser.'

"There was no touch of reproach in his tones. He simply stated a
melancholy fact.

"'But she is a good wife to you in other ways,' I urged. 'She has her
faults, of course. We all have. But she is energetic. Come now, you
will admit she's energetic.'

"I owed it to myself to find some good in Hannah, and this was the only
thing I could think of at that moment.

"'Oh yes, she's that,' he assented. 'A little too much so for our sized
house, I sometimes think.'

"'You see,' he went on, 'she's a bit cornery in her temper, Hannah is;
and then her mother's a bit trying, at times.'

"'Her mother!' I exclaimed, 'but what's _she_ got to do with you?'

"'Well, you see, sir,' he answered, 'she's living with us now--ever since
the old man went off.'

"'Hannah's father! Is he dead, then?'