"Is it very heavy?" asked Millicent.

"Ay!" he replied, with a little grunt. Then the procession set off--
the trundling wheel-barrow, the swinging hissing tree, the two excited
little girls. They arrived at the door. Down went the legs of the
wheel-barrow on the yard. The man looked at the box.

"Where are you going to have it?" he called.

"Put it in the back kitchen," cried his wife.

"You'd better have it where it's going to stop. I don't want to hawk
it about."

"Put it on the floor against the dresser, Father. Put it there,"
urged Millicent.

"You come and put some paper down, then," called the mother hastily.

The two children ran indoors, the man stood contemplative in the cold,
shrugging his uncovered shoulders slightly. The open inner door showed
a bright linoleum on the floor, and the end of a brown side-board on
which stood an aspidistra.

Again with a wrench Aaron Sisson lifted the box. The tree pricked
and stung. His wife watched him as he entered staggering, with his
face averted.

"Mind where you make a lot of dirt," she said.