Like Unto Like Attracted

"I'll give you a bat," flung back Jinnie, walking away.

Some distance off she stood looking down the tracks, her blue eyes noting the row of huts strung along the road and extending toward the hills. At the back of them was a marshland, dense with trees and underbrush.

"My father told me Mr. Grandoken was a painter of houses!" Jinnie ruminated: "But that damn duffer back there says he's changed his work to cobbling. I'll go and see! I hope it won't be long before I'm as warm as can be. Wonder if he'll be glad to see me!"

"It's the smallest house among 'em," she cogitated further, walking very fast. "Well! There ain't any of 'em very big."

She traveled on through heavy snow, glancing at every hut until, coming to a standstill, she read aloud: "Lafe Grandoken, Cobbler of Folks' and Children's Shoes and Boots."

Jinnie turned and, going down a short flight of steps, hesitated a moment before she knocked timidly on the front door. During the moment of waiting she glanced over what she hoped was to be her future home. It was so small in comparison with the huge, lonely farmhouse she had left the night before that her heart grew warm in anticipation. Then in answer to a man's voice, calling "Come in!" she lifted the latch and opened the door.

The room was small and cheerless, although a fire was struggling for life in a miniature stove. In one corner was a table strewn with papers. Back from the window which faced the tracks was a man, a kit of cobbler's tools, in the disarray of daily use, on the bench beside him. He halted, with his hammer in the air, at the sight of the newcomer.