"Some does and some doesn't," said Kettleman, lugubriously.
"Hotel grub," said Scattergood, "gets mighty similar. Roast beef and roast pork! Roast pork and roast beef! Then cold roast pork and beef for supper.... And me obliged, by the way I'm built, to pay extry board. Sundays I always order me two dinners. Seems like a wife 'u'd act as a benefit there."
"But there's drawbacks," said Sam, "and there's mother-in-laws, and there's lendin' a dollar to your brother-in-law."
"The thing to do," said Scattergood, "is to pick one without them impediments. I also figger," he added, wriggling his bare toes, "that a feller ought to pick one that could lend a dollar to your brother in case he needed one."
"Hain't none sich to be found," said Sam.
"I calc'late to look," Scattergood replied.
He had already done his looking. The lady of his choice, tradition says, was older than he, but this is a base libel. She was not older. She had not yet reached thirty. Scattergood had first encountered her when she came to his hardware store to buy a plow. On that occasion her excellent business judgment and her powers of barter had attracted him strongly. As a matter of fact, he was a bit in doubt if she hadn't the best of him on the deal.... Her name was Amanda Randle.
Scattergood gave the matter his best thought, then polished the buggy as aforesaid, and called.
"Howdy, Miss Randle?" said he, tying to her hitching post.
"Howdy, Mr. Baines?"