A voice outside his chamber door made answer.

"Be you awake, Mr. Bangs?" asked Primmie. "Here's your things. Doctor
Powers he come up and got 'em last night after you'd fell asleep and me
and Miss Martha we hung 'em alongside the kitchen stove. They're dried
out fine. Miss Martha says you ain't to get up, though, till the doctor
comes. I'll leave your things right here on the floor.... Or shall I put
'em inside?"

"Oh, no, no! Don't, don't! I mean put them on the floor--ah--outside.
Thank you, thank you."

"Miss Martha said if you was awake to ask you if you felt better."

"Oh, yes--yes, much better, thank you. Thank you--yes."

He waited in some trepidation, until he heard Primmie clump downstairs.
Then he opened the door a crack and retrieved his "things." They were
not only dry, but clean, and the majority of the wrinkles had been
pressed from his trousers and coat. The mud had even been brushed from
his shoes. Not that Galusha noticed all this just then. He was busy
dressing, having a nervous dread that the unconventional Primmie might
find she had forgotten something and come back to bring it.

When he came downstairs there was no one in the sitting room and he had
an opportunity to look about. It was a pleasant apartment, that sitting
room, especially on a morning like this, with the sunshine streaming in
through the eastern windows, windows full of potted plants set upon wire
frames, with hanging baskets of trailing vines and a canary in a cage