"Getting out of it, Mrs. Boomsby," I replied, with the good-nature I had been nursing up-stairs for several minutes.
I wondered whether she knew anything about the snake. The bare thought was enough to assure me that she did not. She would no more have permitted the captain, or any other person, to bring the most harmless reptile into the house, than she would have opened her sleeping apartment for the reception of the sea-serpent, in which both she and her husband believed as in the ocean itself.
"What are you a-doin' here? Can't you let us be here no more'n you could in Michigan? Must you pursue us wherever we go?" demanded the lady, putting the matter in an entirely new light to me, for I believed I had always been able and willing to keep away from the Boomsbys.
"I was invited up-stairs to see you," I began.
"Don't tell me that! Do you think I live in the garret?"
"I thought we were going rather high up; but I supposed Captain Boomsby knew where to find you," I replied, smiling as sweetly as though there were no snakes in the Land of Flowers. "But it seems that your husband lured me up there to make a prisoner of me. He locked me into the little room in the rear attic, which he had fitted up for me by screwing boards over the window."
"Don't tell me such a ry-dicerlous story! I don't believe a word on't. Nobody ever could believe a word you say, Sandy Duddleton!"
"You know very well that I was up there; for I heard your husband tell you so. You talked with him about it, and insisted upon seeing me. But I don't wish to dispute about this matter with you, for I don't think you understand all his plans," I replied, moving towards the head of the stairs, while she planted herself before me so as to prevent my going down.
"Don't talk to me, Sandy Duddleton!"
"I won't talk to you if you will get out of my way, and let me out of the house," I replied, trying to get by her.