in an' want to be trusted for goods—sca'cely any of 'em has any cash, an' you have to wait for your pay till they can raise some kind of produce, an' bring it in. If you can't read faces, you're likely to be a goner, to the amount of what you sell, an' if you refuse, you may be a thousan' times wuss a goner; for if the man's honest, an' also as proud as poor folks usually be, he'll never forgive you, and some other storekeeper'll get all his trade. Or, a stranger passin' through town wants to sell a hoss; you don't know him or the hoss either, or whether they come by each other honestly, an'—But this ain't what you was talkin' about. I'll stir about and see what help I can pick up. I reckon you won't have no trouble in the store while I'm gone; prices is marked on pretty much everythin'. Want to get settled to-day?"

"Yes, if possible."

"Reckon I'll see to makin' fires in the house, then, so's to warm things up. If any customer comes in that you don't quite understand, or wants any goods that bothers you, try to hold him till I get back. 'Twon't be hard. Folks in these parts ain't generally in a drivin' hurry."

"All right. I used to lounge in the stores in our town; I know their ways pretty well, and I remember many prices."

"That's good. Well, if you get stuck, get your wife to help you. There's a good deal in havin' been behind a counter, besides what Mrs. Somerton is of her own self."

Then Caleb turned up his coat-collar and sauntered out.

"Grace," shouted Philip, as soon as the door had closed, "do come here! Allow me to congratulate you on having made a conquest of Caleb Wright. He kindly tolerates me, but 'tis quite plain that he regards you as the head of the family. I was going to replace that shabby old sign over the door, but now I fear that Caleb will demand that the new one shall read 'Mrs. Somerton & Husband.'"

Grace's face glowed as merrily as if it had not been tear-stained half an hour before, and she replied:—

"I've not seen a possible conquest—since I was married—that would give me greater pleasure; for I am you, you know, and you are me, and the you-I would be dreadfully helpless if we hadn't such a man to depend upon."

"'You-I'! That's a good word—a very good one. You ought to be richly paid for coining it."

"Pay me, then, and promptly!" Grace replied.

Some forms of payment consume much time when the circumstances do not require haste: they also have a way of making the payer and payee oblivious to their surroundings, so Philip and Grace supposed themselves alone until they heard the front door close with a loud report, and saw a small boy who seemed to consist entirely of eyes. Grace quickly and intently studied the label of an empty powder keg on the counter, while Philip said:—

"Good morning, young man. What can we do for you?"

"Wantapoundo'shinglenails," was the reply, in nasal monotone.

Philip searched the hardware section of the store, at the same time searching his memory for the price, in his native town, of shingle nails. The packing of the nails, in soft brown paper, was a slow and painful proceeding to a man whose hands in years had encountered nothing harder or rougher than a pen-holder, but when it was completed, the boy, taking the package, departed rapidly.

"He forgot to pay for them," said Grace.

"Yes," Philip replied. "I hope his memory will be equally dormant in other respects."

But it wasn't; for little Scrapsey Green stopped several times, on the way home, to tell acquaintances that "up to Somerton's store ther was a man a-kissin' a woman like all-possessed, an' he wasn't Caleb, neither."

The aforesaid acquaintances made haste to spread the story abroad, as did Scrapsey's own family; so when Caleb returned, an hour later, the store was jammed with apparent customers, and Philip was behind one counter, and Grace behind the other, and the counters themselves were strewn and covered with goods of all sorts, at which the people pretended to look, while they gazed at the "man and woman" of whom they had been told.

"You must be kind o' tuckered out," said Caleb, softly, behind Grace's counter, as he stood an instant with his back to the crowd, and pretended to adjust a shelf of calicoes. "Better take a rest in the back room. I'll relieve you."

Grace responded quickly to the suggestion, while Caleb, leaning over the goods on the counter, said, again softly, to the women nearest him:—

"That's the new Mr. Somerton's wife—an' that's him, at t'other counter."

"Mighty scrumptious gal!" commented a middle-aged woman.

"Yes, an' she's just as nice as she looks. Clear gold an' clear grit, an' her husband's right good stuff, too."

Within two or three minutes Caleb succeeded in signalling Philip to the back room; five minutes later the store was empty, and Caleb joined the couple, and said:—

"Sell much?"

"Not a penny's worth," Grace replied, laughing heartily. "We've been comparing notes."

"Sho!" exclaimed Caleb, although his eyes twinkled. "I met Scrapsey Green up the road, with a pound of shingle-nails that he said come from here, an' I didn't s'pose Scrapsey would lie, for he's one o' my Sunday-school scholars." Philip and Grace quickly reddened, while Caleb continued, "Well, might's well be interduced to the gen'ral public one time's another, I s'pose, 'specially if you can be kept busy, so's not to feel uncomfortable. Besides," he said, after a moment of reflection, "if a man hain't got a right to kiss his own wife, on his own property, whose wife has he got a right to kiss, an' where'bouts?" Then Caleb looked at the account books on the desk, and continued: "Reckon you forgot to charge the nails. Well, I don't wonder."