"'Mr. Badger,' says Hannah, polite and smilin', 'I want to buy a box of
the best cigars you've got.'
"'Ma'am!' says Chris, thinkin' 'twas about time to send for the
constable or the doctor--one or t'other.
"'Yes,' says Hannah; 'if you please. Oh! and, Mr. Badger, please don't
tell anyone I bought 'em. PLEASE don't, to oblige me.'
"So Chris trotted out the cigars--ten cents straight, they was--and said
nothin' to nobody, which is a faculty he has when it pays to have it.
"When Kenelm came home that night he was knocked pretty nigh off his
pins to find his sister waitin' for him. He commenced a long rigmarole
about where he'd been, but Hannah didn't ask no questions. She said that
Washington was mighty fine, but home and Kenelm was good enough for her.
Said the thoughts of him alone had been with her every minute, and she
just HAD to cut the trip short. Kenelm wa'n't any too enthusiastic to
hear it.
"Breakfast next mornin' was a dream. Hannah had been up since five
o'clock gettin' it ready. There was everything on that table that Kenelm
liked 'special. And it all tasted fine, and he ate enough for four. When
'twas over Hannah went to the closet and brought out a bundle.
"'Kenelm,' she says, 'here's somethin' I brought you that'll
surprise you. I've noticed since I've been away that about everybody
smokes--senators and judges, and even Smithsonian Institute folks. And
when I see how much comfort they get out of it, my conscience hurt me
to think that I'd deprived my brother of what he got such a sight of
pleasure from.
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