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“You have a very pleasant home, Aunt Sarah.”

“I’m not complaining any,” was the brief response.

A minute later he happened to look up and caught her gaze. He may have been mistaken, but it seemed to him that she was regarding his performance with knife and fork quite approvingly. When he had finished, Aunt Sarah said grace, which to Joe’s thinking was turning things around, and arose.

“I suppose you brought a trunk with you?” she questioned.

“Yes, ma’am, and it ought to be here. The expressman said he would get it around by eight.”

“Like as not it was Gus Tenney,” said Aunt Sarah. “If it was it won’t get here until afternoon, I guess. He’s the most worthless, shiftless negro in town.” But Aunt Sarah, for once, did the coloured gentleman an injustice, for even as she finished he backed his team up to the sidewalk. “You show him where to put it,” she instructed, “and tell him to be careful and not bump the walls. And don’t pay him a cent more than a quarter of a dollar, Joseph. Have you got any money?”