"Well, the trouble Josh took to carry out that mad fit! He split wood
an' laid it down at Lyddy Ann's door, an' he divided the eggs an' milk,
an' shoved her half inside. He bought her a separate barrel o' flour,
an' all the groceries he could think on; they said he laid money on her
winder-sill. But, take it all together, he was so busy actin' like a
crazed one that he never got his 'taters dug till 'most time for the
frost. Lyddy Ann she never showed her head among the neighbors ag'in.
When she see she'd got to stay there, she begun to cook for herself;
but one day, one o' the neighbors heard her pleadin' with Josh, out in
the cow-yard, while he was milkin'.

"'O Joshuay,' she kep' a-sayin' over 'n' over, 'you needn't take me
back, if you'll on'y let me do your work! You needn't speak to me, an'
I'll live in the other part; but I shall be crazy if you don't let me
do your work. O Joshuay! O Joshuay!' She cried an' cried as if her
heart would break, but Josh went on milkin', an' never said a word.

"I s'pose she thought he'd let her, the old hunks, for the next day,
she baked some pies an' set 'em on the table in his part. She reached
in through the winder to do it. But that night, when Josh come home, he
hove 'em all out into the back yard, an' the biddies eat 'em up. The
last time I was there, I see them very pieces o' pie-plate, white an'
blue-edged, under the syringa bush. Then she kind o' give up hope. I
guess--But no! I'm gittin' ahead o' my story. She did try him once
more. Of course his rooms got to lookin' like a hog's nest--"

"My! I guess when she see him doin' his own washin', she thought the
pocket-book was a small affair," interpolated Mrs. Niles.