"I wonder what ails father!" said Mary, as soon as she was alone
with her mother.

"I don't know," answered Mrs. Bacon, thoughtfully, "he seems
troubled about something."

"I saw that Mr. Dyer, who keeps tavern over in Brookville, talking
with father at the wood-pile this morning."

"You did!" Mrs. Bacon spoke with a new manifestation of interest.

"Yes; and I thought, as I looked at him out of the window, that he
appeared to be angry about something."

Mrs. Bacon did not reply to this remark. Soon after, on meeting her
husband, she said to him,

"What did Mr. Dyer want this morning?"

"Something that he will not get," replied Mr. Bacon.

"The money he loaned you?"

"Yes."

"It's impossible to pay it back now, in the dead of winter," said
Mrs. Bacon, in a troubled tone of voice, "he ought to know that."

"And he does know it."