A Philanthropist | Page 2

The din seemed to come from the
lower part of the house, and after one or two futile appeals to the man
who served as valet, cook, and butler in his bachelor establishment, he
decided that he was alone in his half of the house, and that the noise
came from Miss Gould's side. He strolled down the beautiful winding
staircase, and dragged his crimson dressing-gown to the top of the
cellar stairs, the uproar growing momentarily more terrific. Half-way
down the whitewashed steps he paused, viewing the remarkable scene
below him with interest and amazement. The cemented floor was
literally covered with neatly chopped kindling-wood, which rose as in a
tide under the efforts of a large red-faced man who, with the regularity
of a machine, stooped, grasped a billet in either hand, shook them in the
face of Miss Gould, who cowered upon a soap-box at his side, and
flung them on the floor. From the woodhouse near the cellar muffled
shouts were heard through a storm of blows on the door. From the
rattling of this door, and the fact that the red-faced man aimed every
third stick at it, the observer might readily conclude that some one
desirous of leaving the woodhouse was locked within it.
For a moment the spectator on the stairs stood stunned. The noise was
deafening; the appearance of the man, whose expression was one of
settled rage but whose actions were of the coldest regularity, was most
bewildering, partially obscured as it was by the flying billets of wood;
the mechanical attempts of Miss Gould to rise from the soap-box,
invariably checked by a fierce brandishing of the stick just taken from
the lessening pile, were at once startling and fascinating, inasmuch as
she was methodically waved back just as her knees had unbent for the
trial, and as methodically essayed her escape again, alternately rising
with dignity and sinking back in terror.
The red dressing-gown advanced a step, and met her gaze. Dignity and
terror shifted to relief.
"Oh, Mr. Welles!" she gasped. Her lodger girded up his robe de
chambre with its red silk cord and advanced with decision through the

chaos of birch and hickory. A struggle, sharp but brief, and he turned to
find Miss Gould offering a coil of clothes-rope with which to bind the
conquered, whom conflict had sobered, for he made no resistance.
"What do you mean by such idiotic actions?" the squire of dames
demanded, as he freed the maddened Henry from his durance vile in the
woodhouse and confronted the red-faced man, who had not uttered a
word.
He cast a baffled glance at Miss Gould and a triumphant smile at Henry
before replying. Then, disdaining the lady's righteous indignation and
the hired man's threatening gestures, he faced the gentleman in the
scarlet robe and spoke as man to man.
"Gov'nor," he said with somewhat thickened speech, "I come here an' I
asked for a meal. An' she tol' me would I work fer it? An' I said yes.
An' she come into this ol' vault of a suller, an' she pointed to that ol'
heap o' wood, an' she tol' me ter move it over ter that corner. An' I done
so fer half an hour. An' I says to that blitherin' fool over there, who was
workin' in that ol' wood-house, what the devil did she care w'ich corner
the darned stuff was in? An' he says that she didn't care a hang, but that
she'd tell the next man that come along to move it back to where I got it
from; he said 'twas a matter er principle with her not to give a man a
bite fer nothin'! So I shut him in his ol' house, an' w'en she come down
I gave her a piece of my mind. I don't mind a little work, mister, but
when it come to shufflin' kind-lin's round in this ol' tomb fer half an
hour an' makin' a fool o' myself fer nothin', I got my back up. My time
ain't so vallyble to me as 'tis to some, gov'nor, but it's worth a damn
sight more'n that!"
Miss Gould's lodger shuddered as he remembered the quarter he had
surreptitiously bestowed upon the man, and the withering scorn that
would be his portion were the weakness known. He smiled as he
recalled the scene in the cellar when he had helped Miss Gould up the
stairs and returned to soothe Henry, who regretted that he had left one
timber of the woodhouse upon another.
"Though I'm bound to say, Mr. Welles, that I see how he felt. I've often

felt like a fool explainin' how they was to move that wood back an'
forth. It does seem strange that Miss Gould has