"Is Miss Gastonguay at home?" he asked of an old man servant, who opened the door to him.
"Yes, sir,—she's just a-scolding of old Tribulation," said the demure old man, with ill-concealed satisfaction. "Look at him—" and he threw open the door of a near parlour.
The handsome furniture of the room was pushed on one side, and in the middle of the polished floor stood a second old man, his gray head bent over the handle of a broom, tears raining from his eyes to the floor.
"You sha'n't have one morsel of food to-day, if you don't do this room better," a decided feminine voice was saying. "Now go right over it again."
The clergyman stood silently gazing at the straight back of his hostess. She was dressed in a scant blue serge skirt, a man's coat, a man's hat, thick boots were on her feet, and she carried a riding-whip in her hand. Her hair was cut short, her sex would have been indeterminate to a stranger, but the clergyman knew her well as Miss Jane Gastonguay,—an eccentric, kind-hearted old maid, who loved to masquerade in semi-masculine garments.
Presently the ceasing of the old man's flow of crocodile tears caused her to turn around. "Oh, you are here," she said, coolly, to the clergyman, "I just want some one in your profession to hear me register a vow to send this old fool back to the poorhouse, if he does not mend his ways. This room was to have been done by eight o'clock, and my fine gentleman here lies in bed and smokes instead of sweeping it,—some day he will burn us all up. You would think he was the millionaire and I the pauper. How old are you, idiot?"
"Six—sixty," sobbed the old man.
"That's a falsehood. Tell me the truth, quick now, or you will go right out of this house."
"Six—six—ty—five, ma'am."
"A mere boy,—only one year older than I am. I know an old man of eighty who would be glad to take your place. Haven't I fed and clothed you for years?"