On account of her never having had children of her own, and being alone in that old house for all those years since the untimely (and, some would say, Lord knows I never would, but some would say suspicious) death of her husband (though you have to admit it’s queer as anything, no one ever could explain how in God’s name poor Abner ended up down the bottom of that well), she took quite a shining to the young Miller boy when he began to be of help, and would always invite him in after he’d done whatever his Pa sent him down the hill to do; mending a fence or wrangling a calf; and so often you’d find him sitting on her porch with a cool cup of water in one hand and a biscuit in the other that one might get the impression he was her son, she so doted on the boy, and really it was heartening to see, wasn’t it, after so many years of her being alone; of her being hid away in that drafty place with not a soul for company (it being some time, you remember, before anyone’d go back down that way for anything, after Abner’s eerie passing, rest his soul); and the Miller boy being as he is (one foot in the fairy ring is what Gran would say), well, he was lonely himself, I’d be willing to bet, and being as he is (a kind soul, too gentle to hurt a fly; Mr.