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The Copy-Cat & Other Stories

by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

April, 1999  [Etext #1716]


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The COPY-CAT
& Other Stories

BY
MARY E. WILKINS FREEMAN



CONTENTS

                                                         PAGE

   I.  THE COPY-CAT .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .      1

  II.  THE COCK OF THE WALK  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .     33

 III.  JOHNNY-IN-THE-WOODS   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .     55

  IV.  DANIEL AND LITTLE DAN'L  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .     83

   V.  BIG SISTER SOLLY   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    107

  VI.  LITTLE LUCY ROSE   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    137

 VII.  NOBLESSE  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    163

VIII.  CORONATION   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    183

  IX.  THE AMETHYST COMB  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    211

   X.  THE UMBRELLA MAN   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    237

  XI.  THE BALKING OF CHRISTOPHER  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    267

 XII.  DEAR ANNIE   .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .    293




THE COPY-CAT




THE COPY-CAT

THAT affair of Jim Simmons's cats never became
known. Two little boys and a little girl can
keep a secret -- that is, sometimes. The two little
boys had the advantage of the little girl because they
could talk over the affair together, and the little
girl, Lily Jennings, had no intimate girl friend to
tempt her to confidence. She had only little Amelia
Wheeler, commonly called by the pupils of Madame's
school "The Copy-Cat."

Amelia was an odd little girl -- that is, everybody
called her odd. She was that rather unusual crea-
ture, a child with a definite ideal; and that ideal was
Lily Jennings. However, nobody knew that. If
Amelia's mother, who was a woman of strong charac-
ter, had suspected, she would have taken strenuous
measures to prevent such a peculiar state of affairs;
the more so because she herself did not in the least
approve of Lily Jennings. Mrs. Diantha Wheeler
(Amelia's father had died when she was a baby)
often remarked to her own mother, Mrs. Stark, and
to her mother-in-law, Mrs. Samuel Wheeler, that she
did not feel that Mrs. Jennings was bringing up Lily
exactly as she should. "That child thinks entirely
too much of her looks," said Mrs. Diantha. "When
she walks past here she switches those ridiculous
frilled frocks of hers as if she were entering a ball-
room, and she tosses her head and looks about to see
if anybody is watching her. If I were to see Amelia
doing such things I should be very firm with her."

"Lily Jennings is a very pretty child," said
Mother-in-law Wheeler, with an under-meaning, and
Mrs. Diantha flushed. Amelia did not in the least
resemble the Wheelers, who were a handsome set.
She looked remarkably like her mother, who was a
plain woman, only little Amelia did not have a square
chin. Her chin was pretty and round, with a little
dimple in it. In fact, Amelia's chin was the pretti-
est feature she had. Her hair was phenomenally
straight. It would not even yield to hot curling-
irons, which her grandmother Wheeler had tried sur-
reptitiously several times when there was a little
girls' party. "I never saw such hair as that poor
child has in all my life," she told the other grand-
mother, Mrs. Stark. "Have the Starks always had
such very straight hair?"

Mrs. Stark stiffened her chin. Her own hair was
very straight. "I don't know," said she, "that the
Starks have had any straighter hair than other
people. If Amelia does not have anything worse to
contend with than straight hair I rather think she
will get along in the world as well as most people."

"It's thin, too," said Grandmother Wheeler, with
a sigh, "and it hasn't a mite of color. Oh, well,
Amelia is a good child, and beauty isn't everything."
Grandmother Wheeler said that as if beauty were
a great deal, and Grandmother Stark arose and shook
out her black silk skirts. She had money, and loved
to dress in rich black silks and laces.

"It is very little, very little indeed," said she, and
she eyed Grandmother Wheeler's lovely old face,
like a wrinkled old rose as to color, faultless as to
feature, and swept about by the loveliest waves of
shining silver hair.

Then she went out of the room, and Grandmother
Wheeler, left alone, smiled. She knew the worth of
beauty for those who possess it and those who do not.
She had never been quite reconciled to her son's
marrying such a plain girl as Diantha Stark, although
she had money. She considered beauty on the
whole as a more valuable asset than mere gold.
She regretted always that poor little Amelia, her
only grandchild, was so very plain-looking. She
always knew that Amelia was very plain, and yet
sometimes the child puzzled her. She seemed to see
reflections of beauty, if not beauty itself, in the
little colorless face, in the figure, with its too-large
joints and utter absence of curves. She sometimes
even wondered privately if some subtle resemblance
to the handsome Wheelers might not be in the child
and yet appear. But she was mistaken. What she
saw was pure mimicry of a beautiful ideal.

Little Amelia tried to stand like Lily Jennings;
she tried to walk like her; she tried to smile like
her; she made endeavors, very often futile, to dress
like her. Mrs. Wheeler did not in the least approve
of furbelows for children. Poor little Amelia went
clad in severe simplicity; durable woolen frocks in
winter, and washable, unfadable, and non-soil-show-
ing frocks in summer. She, although her mother had
perhaps more money wherewith to dress her than had
any of the other mothers, was the plainest-clad little
girl in school. Amelia, moreover, never tore a frock,
and, as she did not grow rapidly, one lasted several
seasons. Lily Jennings was destructive, although
dainty. Her pretty clothes were renewed every
year. Amelia was helpless before that problem.
For a little girl burning with aspirations to be and
look like another little girl who was beautiful and
wore beautiful clothes, to be obliged to set forth for
Madame's on a lovely spring morning, when thin
attire was in evidence, dressed in dark-blue-and-
white-checked gingham, which she had worn for
three summers, and with sleeves which, even to
childish eyes, were anachronisms, was a trial. Then
to see Lily flutter in a frock like a perfectly new white
flower was torture; not because of jealousy -- Amelia
was not jealous; but she so admired the other little
girl, and so loved her, and so wanted to be like her.

As for Lily, she hardly ever noticed Amelia. She
was not aware that she herself was an object of
adoration; for she was a little girl who searched for
admiration in the eyes of little boys rather than
little girls, although very innocently. She always
glanced slyly at Johnny Trumbull when she wore a
pretty new frock, to see if he noticed. He never did,
and she was sharp enough to know it. She was also
child enough not to care a bit, but to take a queer
pleasure in the sensation of scorn which she felt in
consequence. She would eye Johnny from head to
foot, his boy's clothing somewhat spotted, his bulging
pockets, his always dusty shoes, and when he twisted
uneasily, not understanding why, she had a thrill
of purely feminine delight. It was on one such occa-
sion that she first noticed Amelia Wheeler particularly.

It was a lovely warm morning in May, and Lily
was a darling to behold -- in a big hat with a wreath
of blue flowers, her hair tied with enormous blue silk
bows, her short skirts frilled with eyelet embroidery,
her slender silk legs, her little white sandals. Ma-
dame's maid had not yet struck the Japanese gong,
and all the pupils were out on the lawn, Amelia, in
her clean, ugly gingham and her serviceable brown
sailor hat, hovering near Lily, as usual, like a common,
very plain butterfly near a particularly resplendent
blossom. Lily really noticed her. She spoke to her
confidentially; she recognized her fully as another of
her own sex, and presumably of similar opinions.

"Ain't boys ugly, anyway?" inquired Lily of
Amelia, and a wonderful change came over Amelia.
Her sallow cheeks bloomed; her eyes showed blue
glitters; her little skinny figure became instinct with
nervous life. She smiled charmingly, with such
eagerness that it smote with pathos and bewitched.

"Oh yes, oh yes," she agreed, in a voice like a quick
flute obbligato. "Boys are ugly."

"Such clothes!" said Lily.

"Yes, such clothes!" said Amelia.

"Always spotted," said Lily.

"Always covered all over with spots," said Amelia.

"And their pockets always full of horrid things,"
said Lily.

"Yes," said Amelia.

Amelia glanced openly at Johnny Trumbull; Lily
with a sidewise effect.

Johnny had heard every word. Suddenly he arose
to action and knocked down Lee Westminster, and
sat on him.

"Lemme up!" said Lee.

Johnny had no quarrel whatever with Lee. He
grinned, but he sat still. Lee, the sat-upon, was a
sharp little boy. "Showing off before the gals!" he
said, in a thin whisper.

"Hush up!" returned Johnny.

"Will you give me a writing-pad -- I lost mine, and
mother said I couldn't have another for a week if I
did -- if I don't holler?" inquired Lee.

"Yes. Hush up!"

Lee lay still, and Johnny continued to sit upon his
prostrate form. Both were out of sight of Madame's
windows, behind a clump of the cedars which graced
her lawn.

"Always fighting," said Lily, with a fine crescendo
of scorn. She lifted her chin high, and also her nose.

"Always fighting," said Amelia, and also lifted her
chin and nose. Amelia was a born mimic. She
actually looked like Lily, and she spoke like her.

Then Lily did a wonderful thing. She doubled her
soft little arm into an inviting loop for Amelia's little
claw of a hand.

"Come along, Amelia Wheeler," said she. "We
don't want to stay near horrid, fighting boys. We
will go by ourselves."

And they went. Madame had a headache that
morning, and the Japanese gong did not ring for
fifteen minutes longer. During that time Lily and
Amelia sat together on a little rustic bench under a
twinkling poplar, and they talked, and a sort of
miniature sun-and-satellite relation was established
between them, although neither was aware of it.
Lily, being on the whole a very normal little girl, and
not disposed to even a full estimate of herself as
compared with others of her own sex, did not dream
of Amelia's adoration, and Amelia, being rarely
destitute of self-consciousness, did not understand the
whole scope of her own sentiments. It was quite
sufficient that she was seated close to this wonderful
Lily, and agreeing with her to the verge of immo-
lation.

"Of course," said Lily, "girls are pretty, and boys
are just as ugly as they can be."

"Oh yes," said Amelia, fervently.

"But," said Lily, thoughtfully, "it is queer how
Johnny Trumbull always comes out ahead in a fight,
and he is not so very large, either."

"Yes," said Amelia, but she realized a pang of
jealousy. "Girls could fight, I suppose," said she.

"Oh yes, and get their clothes all torn and messy,"
said Lily.

"I shouldn't care," said Amelia. Then she added,
with a little toss, "I almost know I could fight."
The thought even floated through her wicked little
mind that fighting might be a method of wearing out
obnoxious and durable clothes.

"You!" said Lily, and the scorn in her voice wilted
Amelia.

"Maybe I couldn't," said she.

"Of course you couldn't, and if you could, what a
sight you'd be. Of course it wouldn't hurt your
clothes as much as some, because your mother dresses
you in strong things, but you'd be sure to get black
and blue, and what would be the use, anyway?
You couldn't be a boy, if you did fight."

"No. I know I couldn't."

"Then what is the use? We are a good deal
prettier than boys, and cleaner, and have nicer
manners, and we must be satisfied."

"You are prettier," said Amelia, with a look of
worshipful admiration at Lily's sweet little face.

"You are prettier," said Lily. Then she added,
equivocally, "Even the very homeliest girl is prettier
than a boy."

Poor Amelia, it was a good deal for her to be called
prettier than a very dusty boy in a fight. She fairly
dimpled with delight, and again she smiled charm-
ingly. Lily eyed her critically.

"You aren't so very homely, after all, Amelia,"
she said. "You needn't think you are."

Amelia smiled again.

"When you look like you do now you are real
pretty," said Lily, not knowing or even suspecting
the truth, that she was regarding in the face of this
little ardent soul her own, as in a mirror.

However, it was after that episode that Amelia
Wheeler was called "Copy-Cat." The two little
girls entered Madame's select school arm in arm,
when the musical gong sounded, and behind them
came Lee Westminster and Johnny Trumbull, sur-
reptitiously dusting their garments, and ever after
the fact of Amelia's adoration and imitation of Lily
Jennings was evident to all. Even Madame became
aware of it, and held conferences with two of the
under teachers.

"It is not at all healthy for one child to model
herself so entirely upon the pattern of another," said
Miss Parmalee.

"Most certainly it is not," agreed Miss Acton, the
music-teacher.

"Why, that poor little Amelia Wheeler had the
rudiments of a fairly good contralto. I had begun
to wonder if the poor child might not be able at
least to sing a little, and so make up for -- other
things; and now she tries to sing high like Lily Jen-
nings, and I simply cannot prevent it. She has
heard Lily play, too, and has lost her own touch, and
now it is neither one thing nor the other."

"I might speak to her mother," said Madame,
thoughtfully. Madame was American born, but she
married a French gentleman, long since deceased,
and his name sounded well on her circulars. She
and her two under teachers were drinking tea in her
library.

Miss Parmalee, who was a true lover of her pupils,
gasped at Madame's proposition. "Whatever you
do, please do not tell that poor child's mother," said
she.

"I do not think it would be quite wise, if I may
venture to express an opinion," said Miss Acton,
who was a timid soul, and always inclined to shy at
her own ideas.

"But why?" asked Madame.

"Her mother," said Miss Parmalee, "is a quite
remarkable woman, with great strength of character,
but she would utterly fail to grasp the situation."

"I must confess," said Madame, sipping her tea,
"that I fail to understand it. Why any child not an
absolute idiot should so lose her own identity in an-
other's absolutely bewilders me. I never heard of
such a case."

Miss Parmalee, who had a sense of humor, laughed
a little. "It is bewildering," she admitted. "And
now the other children see how it is, and call her
'Copy-Cat' to her face, but she does not mind. I
doubt if she understands, and neither does Lily, for
that matter. Lily Jennings is full of mischief, but
she moves in straight lines; she is not conceited or
self-conscious, and she really likes Amelia, without
knowing why."

"I fear Lily will lead Amelia into mischief," said
Madame, "and Amelia has always been such a good
child."

"Lily will never MEAN to lead Amelia into mis-
chief," said loyal Miss Parmalee.

"But she will," said Madame.

"If Lily goes, I cannot answer for Amelia's not
following," admitted Miss Parmalee.

"I regret it all very much indeed," sighed Ma-
dame, "but it does seem to me still that Amelia's
mother --"

"Amelia's mother would not even believe it, in
the first place," said Miss Parmalee.

"Well, there is something in that," admitted Ma-
dame. "I myself could not even imagine such a
situation. I would not know of it now, if you and
Miss Acton had not told me."

"There is not the slightest use in telling Amelia
not to imitate Lily, because she does not know that
she is imitating her," said Miss Parmalee. "If she
were to be punished for it, she could never compre-
hend the reason."

"That is true," said Miss Acton. "I realize that
when the poor child squeaks instead of singing. All
I could think of this morning was a little mouse
caught in a trap which she could not see. She does
actually squeak! -- and some of her low notes, al-
though, of course, she is only a child, and has never
attempted much, promised to be very good."

"She will have to squeak, for all I can see," said
Miss Parmalee. "It looks to me like one of those
situations that no human being can change for better
or worse."

"I suppose you are right," said Madame, "but
it is most unfortunate, and Mrs. Wheeler is such a
superior woman, and Amelia is her only child, and
this is such a very subtle and regrettable affair.
Well, we have to leave a great deal to Providence."

"If," said Miss Parmalee, "she could only get
angry when she is called 'Copy-Cat.'" Miss Parma-
lee laughed, and so did Miss Acton. Then all the
ladies had their cups refilled, and left Providence to
look out for poor little Amelia Wheeler, in her mad
pursuit of her ideal in the shape of another little
girl possessed of the exterior graces which she had
not.

Meantime the little "Copy-Cat" had never been
so happy. She began to improve in her looks also.
Her grandmother Wheeler noticed it first, and spoke
of it to Grandmother Stark. "That child may not
be so plain, after all," said she. "I looked at her
this morning when she started for school, and I
thought for the first time that there was a little re-
semblance to the Wheelers."

Grandmother Stark sniffed, but she looked grati-
fied. "I have been noticing it for some time," said
she, "but as for looking like the Wheelers, I thought
this morning for a minute that I actually saw my
poor dear husband looking at me out of that blessed
child's eyes."

Grandmother Wheeler smiled her little, aggra-
vating, curved, pink smile.

But even Mrs. Diantha began to notice the change
for the better in Amelia. She, however, attributed
it to an increase of appetite and a system of deep
breathing which she had herself taken up and en-
joined Amelia to follow. Amelia was following Lily
Jennings instead, but that her mother did not know.
Still, she was gratified to see Amelia's little sallow
cheeks taking on pretty curves and a soft bloom,
and she was more inclined to listen when Grand-
mother Wheeler ventured to approach the subject
of Amelia's attire.

"Amelia would not be so bad-looking if she were
better dressed, Diantha," said she.

Diantha lifted her chin, but she paid heed. "Why,
does not Amelia dress perfectly well, mother?" she
inquired.

"She dresses well enough, but she needs more
ribbons and ruffles."

"I do not approve of so many ribbons and ruffles,"
said Mrs. Diantha. "Amelia has perfectly neat,
fresh black or brown ribbons for her hair, and ruffles
are not sanitary."

"Ruffles are pretty," said Grandmother Wheeler,
"and blue and pink are pretty colors. Now, that
Jennings girl looks like a little picture."

But that last speech of Grandmother Wheeler's
undid all the previous good. Mrs. Diantha had an
unacknowledged -- even to herself -- disapproval of
Mrs. Jennings which dated far back in the past, for
a reason which was quite unworthy of her and of her
strong mind. When she and Lily's mother had been
girls, she had seen Mrs. Jennings look like a picture,
and had been perfectly well aware that she herself
fell far short of an artist's ideal. Perhaps if Mrs.
Stark had believed in ruffles and ribbons, her daugh-
ter might have had a different mind when Grand-
mother Wheeler had finished her little speech.

As it was, Mrs. Diantha surveyed her small, pretty
mother-in-law with dignified serenity, which savored
only delicately of a snub. "I do not myself approve
of the way in which Mrs. Jennings dresses her daugh-
ter," said she, "and I do not consider that the child
presents to a practical observer as good an appear-
ance as my Amelia."

Grandmother Wheeler had a temper. It was a
childish temper and soon over -- still, a temper.
"Lord," said she, "if you mean to say that you
think your poor little snipe of a daughter, dressed
like a little maid-of-all-work, can compare with that
lovely little Lily Jennings, who is dressed like a
doll! --"

"I do not wish that my daughter should be dressed
like a doll," said Mrs. Diantha, coolly.

"Well, she certainly isn't," said Grandmother
Wheeler. "Nobody would ever take her for a doll
as far as looks or dress are concerned. She may be
GOOD enough. I don't deny that Amelia is a good
little girl, but her looks could be improved on."

"Looks matter very little," said Mrs. Diantha.

"They matter very much," said Grandmother
Wheeler, pugnaciously, her blue eyes taking on a
peculiar opaque glint, as always when she lost her
temper, "very much indeed. But looks can't be
helped. If poor little Amelia wasn't born with pretty
looks, she wasn't. But she wasn't born with such
ugly clothes. She might be better dressed."

"I dress my daughter as I consider best," said
Mrs. Diantha. Then she left the room.

Grandmother Wheeler sat for a few minutes, her
blue eyes opaque, her little pink lips a straight line;
then suddenly her eyes lit, and she smiled. "Poor
Diantha," said she, "I remember how Henry used
to like Lily Jennings's mother before he married
Diantha. Sour grapes hang high." But Grand-
mother Wheeler's beautiful old face was quite soft
and gentle. From her heart she pitied the reacher
after those high-hanging sour grapes, for Mrs. Dian-
tha had been very good to her.

Then Grandmother Wheeler, who had a mild
persistency not evident to a casual observer, began
to make plans and lay plots. She was resolved,
Diantha or not, that her granddaughter, her son's
child, should have some fine feathers. The little
conference had taken place in her own room, a large,
sunny one, with a little storeroom opening from it.
Presently Grandmother Wheeler rose, entered the
storeroom, and began rummaging in some old trunks.
Then followed days of secret work. Grandmother
Wheeler had been noted as a fine needlewoman,
and her hand had not yet lost its cunning. She had
one of Amelia's ugly little ginghams, purloined from
a closet, for size, and she worked two or three dainty
wonders. She took Grandmother Stark into her
confidence. Sometimes the two ladies, by reason
of their age, found it possible to combine with good
results.

"Your daughter Diantha is one woman in a thou-
sand," said Grandmother Wheeler, diplomatically,
one day, "but she never did care much for clothes."

"Diantha," returned Grandmother Stark, with a
suspicious glance, "always realized that clothes were
not the things that mattered."

"And, of course, she is right," said Grandmother
Wheeler, piously. "Your Diantha is one woman in
a thousand. If she cared as much for fine clothes as
some women, I don't know where we should all be.
It would spoil poor little Amelia."

"Yes, it would," assented Grandmother Stark.
"Nothing spoils a little girl more than always to be
thinking about her clothes."

"Yes, I was looking at Amelia the other day, and
thinking how much more sensible she appeared in
her plain gingham than Lily Jennings in all her
ruffles and ribbons. Even if people were all notic-
ing Lily, and praising her, thinks I to myself, 'How
little difference such things really make. Even if
our dear Amelia does stand to one side, and nobody
notices her, what real matter is it?'" Grandmother
Wheeler was inwardly chuckling as she spoke.

Grandmother Stark was at once alert. "Do you
mean to say that Amelia is really not taken so much
notice of because she dresses plainly?" said she.

"You don't mean that you don't know it, as ob-
servant as you are?" replied Grandmother Wheeler.

"Diantha ought not to let it go as far as that," said
Grandmother Stark. Grandmother Wheeler looked
at her queerly. "Why do you look at me like that?"

"Well, I did something I feared I ought not to
have done. And I didn't know what to do, but your
speaking so makes me wonder --"

"Wonder what?"

Then Grandmother Wheeler went to her little
storeroom and emerged bearing a box. She dis-
played the contents -- three charming little white
frocks fluffy with lace and embroidery.

"Did you make them?"

"Yes, I did. I couldn't help it. I thought if the
dear child never wore them, it would be some com-
fort to know they were in the house."

"That one needs a broad blue sash," said Grand-
mother Stark.

Grandmother Wheeler laughed. She took her impe-
cuniosity easily. "I had to use what I had," said she.

"I will get a blue sash for that one," said Grand-
mother Stark, "and a pink sash for that, and a flow-
ered one for that."

"Of course they will make all the difference,"
said Grandmother Wheeler. "Those beautiful sashes
will really make the dresses."

"I will get them," said Grandmother Stark, with
decision. "I will go right down to Mann Brothers'
store now and get them."

"Then I will make the bows, and sew them on,"
replied Grandmother Wheeler, happily.

It thus happened that little Amelia Wheeler was
possessed of three beautiful dresses, although she
did not know it.

For a long time neither of the two conspiring
grandmothers dared divulge the secret. Mrs. Dian-
tha was a very determined woman, and even her
own mother stood somewhat in awe of her. There-
fore, little Amelia went to school during the spring
term soberly clad as ever, and even on the festive
last day wore nothing better than a new blue ging-
ham, made too long, to allow for shrinkage, and new
blue hair-ribbons. The two grandmothers almost
wept in secret conclave over the lovely frocks which
were not worn.

"I respect Diantha," said Grandmother Wheeler.
"You know that. She is one woman in a thousand,
but I do hate to have that poor child go to school
to-day with so many to look at her, and she dressed
so unlike all the other little girls."

"Diantha has got so much sense, it makes her
blind and deaf," declared Grandmother Stark. "I
call it a shame, if she is my daughter."

"Then you don't venture --"

Grandmother Stark reddened. She did not like
to own to awe of her daughter. "I VENTURE, if that is
all," said she, tartly. "You don't suppose I am
afraid of Diantha? -- but she would not let Amelia
wear one of the dresses, anyway, and I don't want
the child made any unhappier than she is."

"Well, I will admit," replied Grandmother Wheel-
er, "if poor Amelia knew she had these beautiful
dresses and could not wear them she might feel
worse about wearing that homely gingham."

"Gingham!" fairly snorted Grandmother Stark.
"I cannot see why Diantha thinks so much of ging-
ham. It shrinks, anyway."

Poor little Amelia did undoubtedly suffer on that
last day, when she sat among the others gaily clad,
and looked down at her own common little skirts.
She was very glad, however, that she had not been
chosen to do any of the special things which would
have necessitated her appearance upon the little
flower-decorated platform. She did not know of the
conversation between Madame and her two as-
sistants.

"I would have Amelia recite a little verse or two,"
said Madame, "but how can I?" Madame adored
dress, and had a lovely new one of sheer dull-blue
stuff, with touches of silver, for the last day.

"Yes," agreed Miss Parmalee, "that poor child is
sensitive, and for her to stand on the platform in
one of those plain ginghams would be too cruel."

"Then, too," said Miss Acton, "she would re-
cite her verses exactly like Lily Jennings. She can
make her voice exactly like Lily's now. Then every-
body would laugh, and Amelia would not know why.
She would think they were laughing at her dress, and
that would be dreadful."

If Amelia's mother could have heard that conver-
sation everything would have been different, al-
though it is puzzling to decide in what way.

It was the last of the summer vacation in
early September, just before school began, that a
climax came to Amelia's idolatry and imitation of
Lily. The Jenningses had not gone away that sum-
mer, so the two little girls had been thrown together
a good deal. Mrs. Diantha never went away during
a summer. She considered it her duty to remain at
home, and she was quite pitiless to herself when it
came to a matter of duty.

However, as a result she was quite ill during the
last of August and the first of September. The sea-
son had been unusually hot, and Mrs. Diantha had
not spared herself from her duty on account of the
heat. She would have scorned herself if she had done
so. But she could not, strong-minded as she was,
avert something like a heat prostration after a long
walk under a burning sun, nor weeks of confinement
and idleness in her room afterward.

When September came, and a night or two of com-
parative coolness, she felt stronger; still she was
compelled by most unusual weakness to refrain from
her energetic trot in her duty-path; and then it was
that something happened.

One afternoon Lily fluttered over to Amelia's,
and Amelia, ever on the watch, spied her.

"May I go out and see Lily?" she asked Grand-
mother Stark.

"Yes, but don't talk under the windows; your
mother is asleep."

Amelia ran out.

"I declare," said Grandmother Stark to Grand-
mother Wheeler, "I was half a mind to tell that
child to wait a minute and slip on one of those
pretty dresses. I hate to have her go on the street
in that old gingham, with that Jennings girl dressed
up like a wax doll."

"I know it."

"And now poor Diantha is so weak -- and asleep
 -- it would not have annoyed her."

"I know it."

Grandmother Stark looked at Grandmother
Wheeler. Of the two she possessed a greater share
of original sin compared with the size of her soul.
Moreover, she felt herself at liberty to circumvent
her own daughter. Whispering, she unfolded a dar-
ing scheme to the other grandmother, who stared
at her aghast a second out of her lovely blue eyes,
then laughed softly.

"Very well," said she, "if you dare."

"I rather think I dare!" said Grandmother Stark.
"Isn't Diantha Wheeler my own daughter?" Grand-
mother Stark had grown much bolder since Mrs.
Diantha had been ill.

Meantime Lily and Amelia walked down the
street until they came to a certain vacant lot inter-
sected by a foot-path between tall, feathery grasses
and goldenrod and asters and milkweed. They en-
tered the foot-path, and swarms of little butterflies
rose around them, and once in a while a protesting
bumblebee.

"I am afraid we will be stung by the bees," said
Amelia.

"Bumblebees never sting," said Lily; and Amelia
believed her.

When the foot-path ended, there was the river-
bank. The two little girls sat down under a clump
of brook willows and talked, while the river, full of
green and blue and golden lights, slipped past them
and never stopped.

Then Lily proceeded to unfold a plan, which was
not philosophical, but naughtily ingenious.  By this
time Lily knew very well that Amelia admired her,
and imitated her as successfully as possible, consid-
ering the drawback of dress and looks.

When she had finished Amelia was quite pale. "I
am afraid, I am afraid, Lily," said she.

"What of?"

"My mother will find out; besides, I am afraid
it isn't right."

"Who ever told you it was wrong?"

"Nobody ever did," admitted Amelia.

"Well, then you haven't any reason to think it is,"
said Lily, triumphantly. "And how is your mother
ever going to find it out?"

"I don't know."

"Isn't she ill in her room? And does she ever
come to kiss you good night, the way my mother
does, when she is well?"

"No," admitted Amelia.

"And neither of your grandmothers?"

"Grandmother Stark would think it was silly,
like mother, and Grandmother Wheeler can't go up
and down stairs very well."

"I can't see but you are perfectly safe. I am the
only one that runs any risk at all. I run a great deal
of risk, but I am willing to take it," said Lily with
a virtuous air. Lily had a small but rather involved
scheme simply for her own ends, which did not seem
to call for much virtue, but rather the contrary.

Lily had overheard Arnold Carruth and Johnny
Trumbull and Lee Westminster and another boy,
Jim Patterson, planning a most delightful affair,
which even in the cases of the boys was fraught with
danger, secrecy, and doubtful rectitude. Not one
of the four boys had had a vacation from the village
that summer, and their young minds had become
charged, as it were, with the seeds of revolution and
rebellion. Jim Patterson, the son of the rector, and
of them all the most venturesome, had planned to
take -- he called it "take"; he meant to pay for it,
anyway, he said, as soon as he could shake enough
money out of his nickel savings-bank -- one of his
father's Plymouth Rock chickens and have a chicken-
roast in the woods back of Dr. Trumbull's. He
had planned for Johnny to take some ears of corn
suitable for roasting from his father's garden; for
Lee to take some cookies out of a stone jar in his
mother's pantry; and for Arnold to take some pota-
toes. Then they four would steal forth under cover
of night, build a camp-fire, roast their spoils, and
feast.

Lily had resolved to be of the party. She resorted
to no open methods; the stones of the fighting suf-
fragettes were not for her, little honey-sweet, curled,
and ruffled darling; rather the time-worn, if not
time-sanctified, weapons of her sex, little instruments
of wiles, and tiny dodges, and tiny subterfuges, which
would serve her best.

"You know," she said to Amelia, "you don't look
like me. Of course you know that, and that can't
be helped; but you do walk like me, and talk like
me, you know that, because they call you 'Copy-
Cat.'"

"Yes, I know," said poor Amelia.

"I don't mind if they do call you 'Copy-Cat,'"
said Lily, magnanimously. "I don't mind a bit.
But, you see, my mother always comes up-stairs to
kiss me good night after I have gone to bed, and to-
morrow night she has a dinner-party, and she will
surely be a little late, and I can't manage unless you
help me. I will get one of my white dresses for you,
and all you have to do is to climb out of your window
into that cedar-tree -- you know you can climb down
that, because you are so afraid of burglars climbing
up -- and you can slip on my dress; you had better
throw it out of the window and not try to climb in
it, because my dresses tear awful easy, and we might
get caught that way. Then you just sneak down to
our house, and I shall be outdoors; and when you
go up-stairs, if the doors should be open, and any-
body should call, you can answer just like me; and I
have found that light curly wig Aunt Laura wore
when she had her head shaved after she had a fever,
and you just put that on and go to bed, and mother
will never know when she kisses you good night.
Then after the roast I will go to your house, and
climb up that tree, and go to bed in your room. And
I will have one of your gingham dresses to wear, and
very early in the morning I will get up, and you get
up, and we both of us can get down the back stairs
without being seen, and run home."

Amelia was almost weeping. It was her worshiped
Lily's plan, but she was horribly scared. "I don't
know," she faltered.

"Don't know! You've got to! You don't love
me one single bit or you wouldn't stop to think about
whether you didn't know." It was the world-old
argument which floors love. Amelia succumbed.

The next evening a frightened little girl clad in
one of Lily Jennings's white embroidered frocks was
racing to the Jenningses' house, and another little
girl, not at all frightened, but enjoying the stimulus
of mischief and unwontedness, was racing to the wood
behind Dr. Trumbull's house, and that little girl was
clad in one of Amelia Wheeler's ginghams. But the
plan went all awry.

Lily waited, snuggled up behind an alder-bush,
and the boys came, one by one, and she heard this
whispered, although there was no necessity for whis-
pering, "Jim Patterson, where's that hen?"

"Couldn't get her. Grabbed her, and all her tail-
feathers came out in a bunch right in my hand, and
she squawked so, father heard. He was in his study
writing his sermon, and he came out, and if I hadn't
hid behind the chicken-coop and then run I couldn't
have got here. But I can't see as you've got any
corn, Johnny Trumbull."

"Couldn't. Every single ear was cooked for din-
ner."

"I couldn't bring any cookies, either," said Lee
Westminster; "there weren't any cookies in the jar."

"And I couldn't bring the potatoes, because the
outside cellar door was locked," said Arnold Car-
ruth. "I had to go down the back stairs and out
the south door, and the inside cellar door opens out
of our dining-room, and I daren't go in there."

"Then we might as well go home," said Johnny
Trumbull. "If I had been you, Jim Patterson, I
would have brought that old hen if her tail-feathers
had come out. Seems to me you scare awful easy."

"Guess if you had heard her squawk!" said Jim,
resentfully. "If you want to try to lick me, come on,
Johnny Trumbull. Guess you don't darse call me
scared again."

Johnny eyed him standing there in the gloom.
Jim was not large, but very wiry, and the ground was
not suited for combat. Johnny, although a victor,
would probably go home considerably the worse in
appearance; and he could anticipate the conse-
quences were his father to encounter him.

"Shucks!" said Johnny Trumbull, of the fine old
Trumbull family and Madame's exclusive school.
"Shucks! who wants your old hen? We had chicken
for dinner, anyway."

"So did we," said Arnold Carruth.

"We did, and corn," said Lee.

"We did," said Jim.

Lily stepped forth from the alder-bush. "If,"
said she, "I were a boy, and had started to have a
chicken-roast, I would have HAD a chicken-roast."

But every boy, even the valiant Johnny Trum-
bull, was gone in a mad scutter. This sudden appari-
tion of a girl was too much for their nerves. They
never even knew who the girl was, although little
Arnold Carruth said she had looked to him like
"Copy-Cat," but the others scouted the idea.

Lily Jennings made the best of her way out of the
wood across lots to the road. She was not in a par-
ticularly enviable case. Amelia Wheeler was pre-
sumably in her bed, and she saw nothing for it but
to take the difficult way to Amelia's.

Lily tore a great rent in the gingham going up the
cedar-tree, but that was nothing to what followed.
She entered through Amelia's window, her prim
little room, to find herself confronted by Amelia's
mother in a wrapper, and her two grandmothers.
Grandmother Stark had over her arm a beautiful
white embroidered dress. The two old ladies had
entered the room in order to lay the white dress on
a chair and take away Amelia's gingham, and there
was no Amelia. Mrs. Diantha had heard the com-
motion, and had risen, thrown on her wrapper, and
come. Her mother had turned upon her.

"It is all your fault, Diantha," she had declared.

"My fault?" echoed Mrs. Diantha, bewildered.
"Where is Amelia?"

"We don't know," said Grandmother Stark, "but
you have probably driven her away from home by
your cruelty."

"Cruelty?"

"Yes, cruelty. What right had you to make that
poor child look like a fright, so people laughed at
her? We have made her some dresses that look
decent, and had come here to leave them, and to
take away those old gingham things that look as if
she lived in the almshouse, and leave these, so she
would either have to wear them or go without, when
we found she had gone."

It was at that crucial moment that Lily entered
by way of the window.

"Here she is now," shrieked Grandmother Stark.
"Amelia, where --" Then she stopped short.

Everybody stared at Lily's beautiful face suddenly
gone white. For once Lily was frightened. She lost
all self-control. She began to sob. She could scarce-
ly tell the absurd story for sobs, but she told, every
word.

Then, with a sudden boldness, she too turned on
Mrs. Diantha.  "They call poor Amelia 'Copy-
Cat,'" said she, "and I don't believe she would ever
have tried so hard to look like me only my mother
dresses me so I look nice, and you send Amelia
to school looking awfully." Then Lily sobbed
again.

"My Amelia is at your house, as I understand?"
said Mrs. Diantha, in an awful voice.

"Ye-es, ma-am."

"Let me go," said Mrs. Diantha, violently, to
Grandmother Stark, who tried to restrain her. Mrs.
Diantha dressed herself and marched down the
street, dragging Lily after her. The little girl had
to trot to keep up with the tall woman's strides, and
all the way she wept.

It was to Lily's mother's everlasting discredit, in
Mrs. Diantha's opinion, but to Lily's wonderful re-
lief, that when she heard the story, standing in the
hall in her lovely dinner dress, with the strains of
music floating from the drawing-room, and cigar
smoke floating from the dining-room, she laughed.
When Lily said, "And there wasn't even any chicken-
roast, mother," she nearly had hysterics.

"If you think this is a laughing matter, Mrs. Jen-
nings, I do not," said Mrs. Diantha, and again her
dislike and sorrow at the sight of that sweet, mirth-
ful face was over her. It was a face to be loved, and
hers was not.

"Why, I went up-stairs and kissed the child good
night, and never suspected," laughed Lily's mother.

"I got Aunt Laura's curly, light wig for her," ex-
plained Lily, and Mrs. Jennings laughed again.

It was not long before Amelia, in her gingham,
went home, led by her mother -- her mother, who
was trembling with weakness now. Mrs. Diantha
did not scold. She did not speak, but Amelia felt
with wonder her little hand held very tenderly by
her mother's long fingers.

When at last she was undressed and in bed, Mrs.
Diantha, looking very pale, kissed her, and so did
both grandmothers.

Amelia, being very young and very tired, went to
sleep. She did not know that that night was to mark
a sharp turn in her whole life. Thereafter she went
to school "dressed like the best," and her mother
petted her as nobody had ever known her mother
could pet.

It was not so very long afterward that Amelia,
out of her own improvement in appearance, devel-
oped a little stamp of individuality.

One day Lily wore a white frock with blue rib-
bons, and Amelia wore one with coral pink. It was
a particular day in school; there was company, and
tea was served.

"I told you I was going to wear blue ribbons,"
Lily whispered to Amelia. Amelia smiled lovingly
back at her.

"Yes, I know, but I thought I would wear pink."




THE COCK OF THE WALK




THE COCK OF THE WALK

DOWN the road, kicking up the dust until he
marched, soldier-wise, in a cloud of it, that
rose and grimed his moist face and added to the
heavy, brown powder upon the wayside weeds and
flowers, whistling a queer, tuneless thing, which yet
contained definite sequences -- the whistle of a bird
rather than a boy -- approached Johnny Trumbull,
aged ten, small of his age, but accounted by his
mates mighty.

Johnny came of the best and oldest family in the
village, but it was in some respects an undesirable
family for a boy. In it survived, as fossils survive
in ancient nooks and crannies of the earth, old traits
of race, unchanged by time and environment. Liv-
ing in a house lighted by electricity, the mental con-
ception of it was to the Trumbulls as the conception
of candles; with telephones at hand, they uncon-
sciously still conceived of messages delivered with
the old saying, "Ride, ride," etc., and relays of
post-horses. They locked their doors, but still had
latch-strings in mind. Johnny's father was a phy-
sician, adopting modern methods of surgery and pre-
scription, yet his mind harked back to cupping and
calomel, and now and then he swerved aside from
his path across the field of the present into the future
and plunged headlong, as if for fresh air, into the
traditional past, and often with brilliant results.

Johnny's mother was a college graduate. She was
the president of the woman's club. She read papers
savoring of such feminine leaps ahead that they
were like gymnastics, but she walked homeward
with the gait of her great-grandmother, and inwardly
regarded her husband as her lord and master. She
minced genteelly, lifting her quite fashionable skirts
high above very slender ankles, which were heredi-
tary. Not a woman of her race had ever gone home
on thick ankles, and they had all gone home. They
had all been at home, even if abroad -- at home in
the truest sense. At the club, reading her inflam-
matory paper, Cora Trumbull's real self remained
at home intent upon her mending, her dusting, her
house economics.  It was something remarkably
like her astral body which presided at the club.

As for her unmarried sister Janet, who was older
and had graduated from a young ladies' seminary
instead of a college, whose early fancy had been
guided into the lady-like ways of antimacassars and
pincushions and wax flowers under glass shades,
she was a straighter proposition. No astral pre-
tensions had Janet. She stayed, body and soul to-
gether, in the old ways, and did not even project
her shadow out of them. There is seldom room
enough for one's shadow in one's earliest way of
life, but there was plenty for Janet's. There had
been a Janet unmarried in every Trumbull family
for generations. That in some subtle fashion ac-
counted for her remaining single. There had also
been an unmarried Jonathan Trumbull, and that
accounted for Johnny's old bachelor uncle Jonathan.
Jonathan was a retired clergyman. He had retired
before he had preached long, because of doctrinal
doubts, which were hereditary. He had a little,
dark study in Johnny's father's house, which was
the old Trumbull homestead, and he passed much
of his time there, debating within himself that mat-
ter of doctrines.

Presently Johnny, assiduously kicking up dust,
met his uncle Jonathan, who passed without the
slightest notice. Johnny did not mind at all. He
was used to it. Presently his own father appeared,
driving along in his buggy the bay mare at a steady
jog, with the next professional call quite clearly
upon her equine mind. And Johnny's father did
not see him. Johnny did not mind that, either.
He expected nothing different.

Then Johnny saw his mother approaching. She
was coming from the club meeting. She held up her
silk skirts high, as usual, and carried a nice little
parcel of papers tied with ribbon. She also did not
notice Johnny, who, however, out of sweet respect
for his mother's nice silk dress, stopped kicking up
dust. Mrs. Trumbull on the village street was really
at home preparing a shortcake for supper.

Johnny eyed his mother's faded but rather beau-
tiful face under the rose-trimmed bonnet with ad-
miration and entire absence of resentment. Then he
walked on and kicked up the dust again. He loved
to kick up the dust in summer, the fallen leaves in
autumn, and the snow in winter. Johnny was not
a typical Trumbull. None of them had ever cared
for simple amusements like that. Looking back for
generations on his father's and mother's side (both
had been Trumbulls, but very distantly related),
none could be discovered who in the least resembled
Johnny. No dim blue eye of retrospection and re-
flection had Johnny; no tendency to tall slender-
ness which would later bow beneath the greater
weight of the soul. Johnny was small, but wiry of
build, and looked able to bear any amount of men-
tal development without a lasting bend of his physi-
cal shoulders. Johnny had, at the early age of ten,
whopped nearly every boy in school, but that was a
secret of honor. It was well known in the school
that, once the Trumbulls heard of it, Johnny could
never whop again. "You fellows know," Johnny
had declared once, standing over his prostrate and
whimpering foe, "that I don't mind getting whopped
at home, but they might send me away to another
school, and then I could never whop any of you
fellows."

Johnny Trumbull kicking up the dust, himself
dust-covered, his shoes, his little queerly fitting dun
suit, his cropped head, all thickly powdered, loved
it. He sniffed in that dust like a grateful incense.
He did not stop dust-kicking when he saw his aunt
Janet coming, for, as he considered, her old black
gown was not worth the sacrifice. It was true that
she might see him. She sometimes did, if she were
not reading a book as she walked. It had always
been a habit with the Janet Trumbulls to read im-
proving books when they walked abroad. To-day
Johnny saw, with a quick glance of those sharp,
black eyes, so unlike the Trumbulls', that his aunt
Janet was reading. He therefore expected her to
pass him without recognition, and marched on kick-
ing up the dust. But suddenly, as he grew nearer
the spry little figure, he was aware of a pair of gray
eyes, before which waved protectingly a hand clad
in a black silk glove with dangling finger-tips, be-
cause it was too long, and it dawned swiftly upon
him that Aunt Janet was trying to shield her face
from the moving column of brown motes.  He
stopped kicking, but it was too late. Aunt Janet
had him by the collar and was vigorously shaking
him with nervous strength.

"You are a very naughty little boy," declared
Aunt Janet. "You should know better than to walk
along the street raising so much dust. No well-
brought-up child ever does such things. Who are
your parents, little boy?"

Johnny perceived that Aunt Janet did not recog-
nize him, which was easily explained. She wore
her reading-spectacles and not her far-seeing ones;
besides, her reading spectacles were obscured by
dust and her nephew's face was nearly obliterated.
Also as she shook him his face was not much in evi-
dence. Johnny disliked, naturally, to tell his aunt
Janet that her own sister and brother-in-law were
the parents of such a wicked little boy. He there-
fore kept quiet and submitted to the shaking, mak-
ing himself as limp as a rag. This, however, exas-
perated Aunt Janet, who found herself encumbered
by a dead weight of a little boy to be shaken, and
suddenly Johnny Trumbull, the fighting champion
of the town, the cock of the walk of the school,
found himself being ignominiously spanked. That
was too much. Johnny's fighting blood was up.
He lost all consideration for circumstances, he for-
got that Aunt Janet was not a boy, that she was quite
near being an old lady. She had overstepped the
bounds of privilege of age and sex, and an alarming
state of equality ensued. Quickly the tables were
turned. The boy became far from limp. He stiff-
ened, then bounded and rebounded like wire. He
butted, he parried, he observed all his famous tac-
tics of battle, and poor Aunt Janet sat down in the
dust, black dress, bonnet, glasses (but the glasses
were off and lost), little improving book, black silk
gloves, and all; and Johnny, hopeless, awful, irrev-
erent, sat upon his Aunt Janet's plunging knees,
which seemed the most lively part of her. He kept
his face twisted away from her, but it was not from
cowardice.  Johnny was afraid lest Aunt Janet
should be too much overcome by the discovery of
his identity. He felt that it was his duty to spare
her that. So he sat still, triumphant but inwardly
aghast.

It was fast dawning upon him that his aunt was
not a little boy. He was not afraid of any punish-
ment which might be meted out to him, but he was
simply horrified. He himself had violated all the
honorable conditions of warfare. He felt a little
dizzy and ill, and he felt worse when he ventured
a hurried glance at Aunt Janet's face. She was very
pale through the dust, and her eyes were closed.
Johnny thought then that he had killed her.

He got up -- the nervous knees were no longer
plunging; then he heard a voice, a little-girl voice,
always shrill, but now high pitched to a squeak with
terror. It was the voice of Lily Jennings. She
stood near and yet aloof, a lovely little flower of a
girl, all white-scalloped frills and ribbons, with a
big white-frilled hat shading a pale little face and.
covering the top of a head decorated with wonder-
ful yellow curls. She stood behind a big baby-car-
riage with a pink-lined muslin canopy and con-
taining a nest of pink and white, but an empty nest.
Lily's little brother's carriage had a spring broken,
and she had been to borrow her aunt's baby-carriage,
so that nurse could wheel little brother up and down
the veranda. Nurse had a headache, and the maids
were busy, and Lily, who was a kind little soul and,
moreover, imaginative, and who liked the idea of
pushing an empty baby-carriage, had volunteered
to go for it. All the way she had been dreaming of
what was not in the carriage. She had come directly
out of a dream of doll twins when she chanced upon
the tragedy in the road.

"What have you been doing now, Johnny Trum-
bull?" said she. She was tremulous, white with
horror, but she stood her ground. It was curious,
but Johnny Trumbull, with all his bravery, was
always cowed before Lily. Once she had turned and
stared at him when he had emerged triumphant
but with bleeding nose from a fight; then she had
sniffed delicately and gone her way. It had only
taken a second, but in that second the victor had
met moral defeat.

He looked now at her pale, really scared face, and
his own was as pale. He stood and kicked the dust
until the swirling column of it reached his head.

"That's right," said Lily; "stand and kick up
dust all over me. WHAT have you been doing?"

Johnny was trembling so he could hardly stand.
He stopped kicking dust.

"Have you killed your aunt?" demanded Lily.
It was monstrous, but she had a very dramatic im-
agination, and there was a faint hint of enjoyment
in her tragic voice.

"Guess she's just choked by dust," volunteered
Johnny, hoarsely. He kicked the dust again.

"That's right," said Lily. "If she's choked to
death by dust, stand there and choke her some more.
You are a murderer, Johnny Trumbull, and my
mamma will never allow me to speak to you again,
and Madame will not allow you to come to school.
AND -- I see your papa driving up the street, and there
is the chief policeman's buggy just behind." Lily
acquiesced entirely in the extraordinary coincidence
of the father and the chief of police appearing upon
the scene. The unlikely seemed to her the likely.
"NOW," said she, cheerfully, "you will be put in
state prison and locked up, and then you will be put
to death by a very strong telephone."

Johnny's father was leaning out of his buggy, look-
ing back at the chief of police in his, and the mare
was jogging very slowly in a perfect reek of dust.
Lily, who was, in spite of her terrific imagination,
human and a girl, rose suddenly to heights of pity
and succor. "They shall never take you, Johnny
Trumbull," said she. "I will save you."

Johnny by this time was utterly forgetful of his
high status as champion (behind her back) of Ma-
dame's very select school for select children of a
somewhat select village. He was forgetful of the
fact that a champion never cries. He cried; he
blubbered; tears rolled over his dusty cheeks, mak-
ing furrows like plowshares of grief. He feared lest
he might have killed his aunt Janet. Women, and
not very young women, might presumably be un-
able to survive such rough usage as very tough
and at the same time very limber little boys, and
he loved his poor aunt Janet. He grieved because
of his aunt, his parents, his uncle, and rather more
particularly because of himself. He was quite sure
that the policeman was coming for him. Logic had
no place in his frenzied conclusions. He did not
consider how the tragedy had taken place entirely
out of sight of a house, that Lily Jennings was the
only person who had any knowledge of it. He looked
at the masterful, fair-haired little girl like a baby.
"How?" sniffed he.

For answer, Lily pointed to the empty baby-car-
riage. "Get right in," she ordered.

Even in this dire extremity Johnny hesitated.
"Can't."

"Yes, you can. It is extra large. Aunt Laura's
baby was a twin when he first came; now he's just
an ordinary baby, but his carriage is big enough for
two. There's plenty of room. Besides, you're a
very small boy, very small of your age, even if you
do knock all the other boys down and have mur-
dered your aunt. Get in. In a minute they will
see you."

There was in reality no time to lose. Johnny
did get in. In spite of the provisions for twins,
there was none too much room.

Lily covered him up with the fluffy pink-and-lace
things, and scowled. "You hump up awfully,"
she muttered. Then she reached beneath him and
snatched out the pillow on which he lay, the baby's
little bed. She gave it a swift toss over the fringe
of wayside bushes into a field. "Aunt Laura's nice
embroidered pillow," said she. "Make yourself just
as flat as you can, Johnny Trumbull."

Johnny obeyed, but he was obliged to double him-
self up like a jack-knife. However, there was no
sign of him visible when the two buggies drew up.
There stood a pale and frightened little girl, with
a baby-carriage canopied with rose and lace and
heaped up with rosy and lacy coverlets, presumably
sheltering a sleeping infant. Lily was a very keen
little girl. She had sense enough not to run. The
two men, at the sight of Aunt Janet prostrate in the
road, leaped out of their buggies. The doctor's
horse stood still; the policeman's trotted away, to
Lily's great relief. She could not imagine Johnny's
own father haling him away to state prison and
the stern Arm of Justice. She stood the fire of
bewildered questions in the best and safest fashion.
She wept bitterly, and her tears were not assumed.
Poor little Lily was all of a sudden crushed under
the weight of facts. There was Aunt Janet, she had
no doubt, killed by her own nephew, and she was
hiding the guilty murderer. She had visions of
state prison for herself. She watched fearfully while
the two men bent over the prostrate woman, who
very soon began to sputter and gasp and try to sit
up.

"What on earth is the matter, Janet?" inquired
Dr. Trumbull, who was paler than his sister-in-
law. In fact, she was unable to look very pale on
account of dust.

"Ow!" sputtered Aunt Janet, coughing violently,
"get me up out of this dust, John. Ow!"

"What was the matter?"

"Yes, what has happened, madam?" demanded
the chief of police, sternly.

"Nothing," replied Aunt Janet, to Lily's and
Johnny's amazement. "What do you think has
happened? I fell down in all this nasty dust. Ow!"

"What did you eat for luncheon, Janet?" in-
quired Dr. Trumbull, as he assisted his sister-in-
law to her feet.

"What I was a fool to eat," replied Janet Trum-
bull, promptly. "Cucumber salad and lemon jelly
with whipped cream."

"Enough to make anybody have indigestion,"
said Dr. Trumbull. "You have had one of these
attacks before, too, Janet. You remember the time
you ate strawberry shortcake and ice-cream?"

Janet nodded meekly. Then she coughed again.
"Ow, this dust!" gasped she. "For goodness' sake,
John, get me home where I can get some water and
take off these dusty clothes or I shall choke to
death."

"How does your stomach feel?" inquired Dr.
Trumbull.

"Stomach is all right now, but I am just choking
to death with the dust." Janet turned sharply tow-
ard the policeman. "You have sense enough to
keep still, I hope," said she. "I don't want the
whole town ringing with my being such an idiot as
to eat cucumbers and cream together and being
found this way." Janet looked like an animated
creation of dust as she faced the chief of police.

"Yes, ma'am," he replied, bowing and scraping
one foot and raising more dust.

He and Dr. Trumbull assisted Aunt Janet into
the buggy, and they drove off. Then the chief of
police discovered that his own horse had gone.
"Did you see which way he went, sis?" he inquired
of Lily, and she pointed down the road, and sobbed
as she did so.

The policeman said something bad under his
breath, then advised Lily to run home to her rna,
and started down the road.

When he was out of sight, Lily drew back the
pink-and-white things from Johnny's face. "Well,
you didn't kill her this time," said she.

"Why do you s'pose she didn't tell all about it?"
said Johnny, gaping at her.

"How do I know? I suppose she was ashamed
to tell how she had been fighting, maybe."

"No, that was not why," said Johnny in a deep
voice.

"Why was it, then?"

"SHE KNEW."

Johnny began to climb out of the baby-carriage.

"What will she do next, then?" asked Lily.

"I don't know," Johnny replied, gloomily.

He was out of the carriage then, and Lily was
readjusting the pillows and things. "Get that nice
embroidered pillow I threw over the bushes," she
ordered, crossly. Johnny obeyed. When she had
finished putting the baby-carriage to rights she
turned upon poor little Johnny Trumbull, and her
face wore the expression of a queen of tragedy.
"Well," said Lily Jennings, "I suppose I shall have
to marry you when I am grown up, after all this."

Johnny gasped. He thought Lily the most beau-
tiful girl he knew, but to be confronted with murder
and marriage within a few minutes was almost too
much. He flushed a burning red. He laughed fool-
ishly. He said nothing.

"It will be very hard on me," stated Lily, "to
marry a boy who tried to murder his nice aunt."

Johnny revived a bit under this feminine disdain.
"I didn't try to murder her," he said in a weak
voice.

"You might have, throwing her down in all that
awful dust, a nice, clean lady. Ladies are not like
boys. It might kill them very quickly to be knocked
down on a dusty road."

"I didn't mean to kill her."

"You might have."

"Well, I didn't, and -- she --"

"What?"

"She spanked me."

"Pooh! That doesn't amount to anything,"
sniffed Lily.

"It does if you are a boy."

"I don't see why."

"Well, I can't help it if you don't. It does."

"Why shouldn't a boy be spanked when he's
naughty, just as well as a girl, I would like to know?"

"Because he's a boy."

Lily looked at Johnny Trumbull. The great fact
did remain. He had been spanked, he had thrown
his own aunt down in the dust. He had taken ad-
vantage of her little-girl protection, but he was a
boy. Lily did not understand his why at all, but
she bowed before it. However, that she would not
admit. She made a rapid change of base. "What,"
said she, "are you going to do next?"

Johnny stared at her. It was a puzzle.

"If," said Lily, distinctly, "you are afraid to go
home, if you think your aunt will tell, I will let you
get into Aunt Laura's baby-carriage again, and I
will wheel you a little way."

Johnny would have liked at that moment to knock
Lily down, as he had his aunt Janet. Lily looked
at him shrewdly. "Oh yes," said she, "you can
knock me down in the dust there if you want to,
and spoil my nice clean dress. You will be a boy,
just the same."

"I will never marry you, anyway," declared
Johnny.

"Aren't you afraid I'll tell on you and get you
another spanking if you don't?"

"Tell if you want to. I'd enough sight rather be
spanked than marry you."

A gleam of respect came into the little girl's
wisely regarding blue eyes. She, with the swiftness
of her sex, recognized in forlorn little Johnny the
making of a man. "Oh, well," said she, loftily,
"I never was a telltale, and, anyway, we are not
grown up, and there will be my trousseau to get,
and a lot of other things to do first. I shall go to
Europe before I am married, too, and I might meet
a boy much nicer than you on the steamer."

"Meet him if you want to."

Lily looked at Johnny Trumbull with more than
respect -- with admiration -- but she kept guard over
her little tongue. "Well, you can leave that for
the future," said she with a grown-up air.

"I ain't going to leave it. It's settled for good
and all now," growled Johnny.

To his immense surprise, Lily curved her white
embroidered sleeve over her face and began to weep.

"What's the matter now?" asked Johnny, sulkily,
after a minute.

"I think you are a real horrid boy," sobbed Lily.

Lily looked like nothing but a very frilly, sweet,
white flower. Johnny could not see her face. There
was nothing to be seen except that delicate fluff of
white, supported on dainty white-socked, white-
slippered limbs.

"Say," said Johnny.

"You are real cruel, when I -- I saved your -- li-fe,"
wailed Lily.

"Say," said Johnny, "maybe if I don't see any
other girl I like better I will marry you when I am
grown up, but I won't if you don't stop that howl-
ing."

Lily stopped immediately. She peeped at him,
a blue peep from under the flopping, embroidered
brim of her hat. "Are you in earnest?" She smiled
faintly. Her blue eyes, wet with tears, were lovely;
so was her hesitating smile.

"Yes, if you don't act silly," said Johnny. "Now
you had better run home, or your mother will won-
der where that baby-carriage is."

Lily walked away, smiling over her shoulder, the
smile of the happily subjugated. "I won't tell any-
body, Johnny," she called back in her flute-like
voice.

"Don't care if you do," returned Johnny, looking
at her with chin in the air and shoulders square,
and Lily wondered at his bravery.

But Johnny was not so brave and he did care. He
knew that his best course was an immediate return
home, but he did not know what he might have to
face. He could not in the least understand why his
aunt Janet had not told at once. He was sure that
she knew. Then he thought of a possible reason for
her silence; she might have feared his arrest at the
hands of the chief of police. Johnny quailed. He
knew his aunt Janet to be rather a brave sort of
woman. If she had fears, she must have had reason
for them. He might even now be arrested. Suppose
Lily did tell. He had a theory that girls usually
told. He began to speculate concerning the horrors
of prison. Of course he would not be executed,
since his aunt was obviously very far from being
killed, but he might be imprisoned for a long term.

Johnny went home. He did not kick the dust
any more. He walked very steadily and staidly.
When he came in sight of the old Colonial mansion,
with its massive veranda pillars, he felt chilly. How-
ever, he went on. He passed around to the south
door and entered and smelled shortcake. It would
have smelled delicious had he not had so much on
his mind. He looked through the hall, and had a
glimpse of his uncle Jonathan in the study, writing.
At the right of the door was his father's office. The
door of that was open, and Johnny saw his father
pouring things from bottles. He did not look at
Johnny. His mother crossed the hall. She had
on a long white apron, which she wore when making
her famous cream shortcakes. She saw Johnny,
but merely observed, "Go and wash your face and
hands, Johnny; it is nearly supper-time."

Johnny went up-stairs. At the upper landing he
found his aunt Janet waiting for him. "Come
here," she whispered, and Johnny followed her,
trembling, into her own room. It was a large room,
rather crowded with heavy, old-fashioned furni-
ture. Aunt Janet had freed herself from dust and
was arrayed in a purple silk gown. Her hair was
looped loosely on either side of her long face. She
was a handsome woman, after a certain type.

"Stand here, Johnny," said she. She had closed
the door, and Johnny was stationed before her.
She did not seem in the least injured nor the worse
for her experience. On the contrary, there was a
bright-red flush on her cheeks, and her eyes shone
as Johnny had never seen them. She looked eagerly
at Johnny.

"Why did you do that?" she said, but there was
no anger in her voice.

"I forgot," began Johnny.

"Forgot what?" Her voice was strained with
eagerness.

"That you were not another boy," said Johnny.

"Tell me," said Aunt Janet. "No, you need not
tell me, because if you did it might be my duty to
inform your parents. I know there is no need of
your telling. You MUST be in the habit of fighting
with the other boys."

"Except the little ones," admitted Johnny.

To Johnny's wild astonishment, Aunt Janet seized
him by the shoulders and looked him in the eyes
with a look of adoration and immense approval.
"Thank goodness," said she, "at last there is going
to be a fighter in the Trumbull family. Your uncle
would never fight, and your father would not. Your
grandfather would. Your uncle and your father are
good men, though; you must try to be like them,
Johnny."

"Yes, ma'am," replied Johnny, bewildered.

"I think they would be called better men than
your grandfather and my father," said Aunt Janet.

"Yes, ma'am."

"I think it is time for you to have your grand-
father's watch," said Aunt Janet. "I think you are
man enough to take care of it." Aunt Janet had
all the time been holding a black leather case. Now
she opened it, and Johnny saw the great gold watch
which he had seen many times before and had always
understood was to be his some day, when he was a
man. "Here," said Aunt Janet. "Take good care
of it. You must try to be as good as your uncle and
father, but you must remember one thing -- you
will wear a watch which belonged to a man who
never allowed other men to crowd him out of the
way he elected to go."

"Yes, ma'am," said Johnny.  He took the
watch.

"What do you say?" inquired his aunt, sharply.

"Thank you."

"That's right. I thought you had forgotten your
manners. Your grandfather never did."

"I am sorry. Aunt Janet," muttered Johnny,
"that I --"

"You need never say anything about that," his
aunt returned, quickly. "I did not see who you
were at first. You are too old to be spanked by a
woman, but you ought to be whipped by a man,
and I wish your grandfather were alive to do it."

"Yes, ma'am," said Johnny. He looked at her
bravely. "He could if he wanted to," said he.

Aunt Janet smiled at him proudly. "Of course,"
said she, "a boy like you never gets the worst of it
fighting with other boys."

"No, ma'am," said Johnny.

Aunt Janet smiled again. "Now run and wash
your face and hands," said she; "you must not keep
supper waiting. Your mother has a paper to write
for her club, and I have promised to help her."

"Yes, ma'am," said Johnny. He walked out,
carrying the great gold timepiece, bewildered, em-
barrassed, modest beneath his honors, but little
cock of the walk, whether he would or no, for reasons
entirely and forever beyond his ken.




JOHNNY-IN-THE-WOODS




JOHNNY-IN-THE-WOODS

JOHNNY TRUMBULL, he who had demon-
strated his claim to be Cock of the Walk by a
most impious hand-to-hand fight with his own aunt,
Miss Janet Trumbull, in which he had been deci-
sively victorious, and won his spurs, consisting of his
late grandfather's immense, solemnly ticking watch,
was to take a new path of action. Johnny suddenly
developed the prominent Trumbull trait, but in his
case it was inverted. Johnny, as became a boy of
his race, took an excursion into the past, but instead
of applying the present to the past, as was the
tendency of the other Trumbulls, he forcibly applied
the past to the present. He fairly plastered the
past over the exigencies of his day and generation
like a penetrating poultice of mustard, and the
results were peculiar.

Johnny, being bidden of a rainy day during the
midsummer vacation to remain in the house, to
keep quiet, read a book, and be a good boy, obeyed,
but his obedience was of a doubtful measure of
wisdom.

Johnny got a book out of his uncle Jonathan Trum-
bull's dark little library while Jonathan was walking
sedately to the post-office, holding his dripping
umbrella at a wonderful slant of exactness, without
regard to the wind, thereby getting the soft drive
of the rain full in his face, which became, as it
were, bedewed with tears, entirely outside any
cause of his own emotions.

Johnny probably got the only book of an anti-
orthodox trend in his uncle's library. He found
tucked away in a snug corner an ancient collection
of Border Ballads, and he read therein of many
unmoral romances and pretty fancies, which, since
he was a small boy, held little meaning for him, or
charm, beyond a delight in the swing of the rhythm,
for Johnny had a feeling for music. It was when he
read of Robin Hood, the bold Robin Hood, with his
dubious ethics but his certain and unquenchable
interest, that Johnny Trumbull became intent. He
had the volume in his own room, being somewhat
doubtful as to whether it might be of the sort
included in the good-boy role. He sat beside a rain-
washed window, which commanded a view of the
wide field between the Trumbull mansion and Jim
Simmons's house, and he read about Robin Hood
and his Greenwood adventures, his forcible setting
the wrong right; and for the first time his imagina-
tion awoke, and his ambition. Johnny Trumbull,
hitherto hero of nothing except little material fist-
fights, wished now to become a hero of true romance.

In fact, Johnny considered seriously the possi-
bility of reincarnating, in his own person, Robin
Hood.  He eyed the wide green field dreamily
through his rain-blurred window. It was a pretty
field, waving with feathery grasses and starred with
daisies and buttercups, and it was very fortunate
that it happened to be so wide. Jim Simmons's
house was not a desirable feature of the landscape,
and looked much better several acres away. It was
a neglected, squalid structure, and considered a dis-
grace to the whole village. Jim was also a disgrace,
and an unsolved problem. He owned that house,
and somehow contrived to pay the taxes thereon.
He also lived and throve in bodily health in spite of
evil ways, and his children were many. There
seemed no way to dispose finally of Jim Simmons
and his house except by murder and arson, and the
village was a peaceful one, and such measures were
entirely too strenuous.

Presently Johnny, staring dreamily out of his
window, saw approaching a rusty-black umbrella
held at precisely the wrong angle in respect of the
storm, but held with the unvarying stiffness with
which a soldier might hold a bayonet, and knew it
for his uncle Jonathan's umbrella. Soon he beheld
also his uncle's serious, rain-drenched face and his
long ambling body and legs. Jonathan was coming
home from the post-office, whither he repaired every
morning. He never got a letter, never anything
except religious newspapers, but the visit to the
post-office was part of his daily routine. Rain or
shine, Jonathan Trumbull went for the morning
mail, and gained thereby a queer negative enjoy-
ment of a perfectly useless duty performed. Johnny
watched his uncle draw near to the house, and cruelly
reflected how unlike Robin Hood he must be. He
even wondered if his uncle could possibly have read
Robin Hood and still show absolutely no result in his
own personal appearance. He knew that he, Johnny,
could not walk to the post-office and back, even with
the drawback of a dripping old umbrella instead of
a bow and arrow, without looking a bit like Robin
Hood, especially when fresh from reading about him.

Then suddenly something distracted his thoughts
from Uncle Jonathan. The long, feathery grass in
the field moved with a motion distinct from that
caused by the wind and rain. Johnny saw a tiger-
striped back emerge, covering long leaps of terror.
Johnny knew the creature for a cat afraid of Uncle
Jonathan. Then he saw the grass move behind the
first leaping, striped back, and he knew there were
more cats afraid of Uncle Jonathan. There were
even motions caused by unseen things, and he
reasoned, "Kittens afraid of Uncle Jonathan."
Then Johnny reflected with a great glow of indigna-
tion that the Simmonses kept an outrageous num-
ber of half-starved cats and kittens, besides a quota
of children popularly supposed to be none too well
nourished, let alone properly clothed. Then it was
that Johnny Trumbull's active, firm imagination
slapped the past of old romance like a most thorough
mustard poultice over the present. There could be
no Lincoln Green, no following of brave outlaws
(that is, in the strictest sense), no bows and arrows,
no sojourning under greenwood trees and the rest,
but something he could, and would, do and be.
That rainy day when Johnny Trumbull was a good
boy, and stayed in the house, and read a book,
marked an epoch.

That night when Johnny went into his aunt
Janet's room she looked curiously at his face, which
seemed a little strange to her. Johnny, since he had
come into possession of his grandfather's watch,
went every night, on his way to bed, to his aunt's
room for the purpose of winding up that ancient
timepiece, Janet having a firm impression that it
might not be done properly unless under her super-
vision. Johnny stood before his aunt and wound up
the watch with its ponderous key, and she watched
him.

"What have you been doing all day, John?" said
she.

"Stayed in the house and -- read."

"What did you read, John?"

"A book."

"Do you mean to be impertinent, John?"

"No, ma'am," replied Johnny, and with perfect
truth. He had not the slightest idea of the title of
the book.

"What was the book?"

"A poetry book."

"Where did you find it?"

"In Uncle Jonathan's library."

"Poetry In Uncle Jonathan's library?" said Janet,
in a mystified way. She had a general impression
of Jonathan's library as of century-old preserves,
altogether dried up and quite indistinguishable one
from the other except by labels. Poetry she could
not imagine as being there at all. Finally she
thought of the early Victorians, and Spenser and
Chaucer. The library might include them, but she
had an idea that Spenser and Chaucer were not fit
reading for a little boy. However, as she remem-
bered Spenser and Chaucer, she doubted if Johnny
could understand much of them. Probably he had
gotten hold of an early Victorian, and she looked
rather contemptuous.

"I don't think much of a boy like you reading
poetry," said Janet. "Couldn't you find anything
else to read?"

"No, ma'am." That also was truth. Johnny,
before exploring his uncle's theological library, had
peered at his father's old medical books and his
mother's bookcases, which contained quite terrify-
ing uniform editions of standard things written by
women.

"I don't suppose there ARE many books written for
boys," said Aunt Janet, reflectively.

"No, ma'am," said Johnny. He finished winding
the watch, and gave, as was the custom, the key to
Aunt Janet, lest he lose it.

"I will see if I cannot find some books of travels
for you, John," said Janet. "I think travels would
be good reading for a boy. Good night, John."

"Good night. Aunt Janet," replied Johnny. His
aunt never kissed him good night, which was one
reason why he liked her.

On his way to bed he had to pass his mother's room,
whose door stood open. She was busy writing at her
desk. She glanced at Johnny.

"Are you going to bed?" said she.

"Yes, ma'am."

Johnny entered the room and let his mother kiss his
forehead, parting his curly hair to do so. He loved
his mother, but did not care at all to have her kiss
him. He did not object, because he thought she
liked to do it, and she was a woman, and it was a
very little thing in which he could oblige her.

"Were you a good boy, and did you find a good
book to read?" asked she.

"Yes, ma'am."

"What was the book?" Cora Trumbull inquired,
absently, writing as she spoke.

"Poetry."

Cora laughed. " Poetry is odd for a boy," said she.
"You should have read a book of travels or history.
Good night, Johnny."

"Good night, mother."

Then Johnny met his father, smelling strongly of
medicines, coming up from his study. But his father
did not see him. And Johnny went to bed, having
imbibed from that old tale of Robin Hood more of
history and more knowledge of excursions into realms
of old romance than his elders had ever known during
much longer lives than his.

Johnny confided in nobody at first. His feeling
nearly led him astray in the matter of Lily Jennings;
he thought of her, for one sentimental minute, as
Robin Hood's Maid Marion. Then he dismissed
the idea peremptorily. Lily Jennings would simply
laugh. He knew her. Moreover, she was a girl,
and not to be trusted. Johnny felt the need of
another boy who would be a kindred spirit; he
wished for more than one boy. He wished for a
following of heroic and lawless souls, even as Robin
Hood's. But he could think of nobody, after con-
siderable study, except one boy, younger than him-
self. He was a beautiful little boy, whose mother
had never allowed him to have his golden curls
cut, although he had been in trousers for quite a
while. However, the trousers were foolish, being
knickerbockers, and accompanied by low socks,
which revealed pretty, dimpled, babyish legs. The
boy's name was Arnold Carruth, and that was against
him, as being long, and his mother firm about al-
lowing no nickname. Nicknames in any case were
not allowed in the very exclusive private school
which Johnny attended.

Arnold Carruth, in spite of his being such a beau-
tiful little boy, would have had no standing at all
in the school as far as popularity was concerned
had it not been for a strain of mischief which tri-
umphed over curls, socks, and pink cheeks and a
much-kissed rosebud of a mouth. Arnold Carruth,
as one of the teachers permitted herself to state
when relaxed in the bosom of her own family, was
"as choke-full of mischief as a pod of peas. And the
worst of it all is," quoth the teacher, Miss Agnes
Rector, who was a pretty young girl, with a hidden
sympathy for mischief herself -- "the worst of it is,
that child looks so like a cherub on a rosy cloud that
even if he should be caught nobody would believe
it. They would be much more likely to accuse poor
little Andrew Jackson Green, because he has a snub
nose and is a bit cross-eyed, and I never knew that
poor child to do anything except obey rules and learn
his lessons. He is almost too good. And another
worst of it is, nobody can help loving that little imp
of a Carruth boy, mischief and all. I believe the
scamp knows it and takes advantage of it."

It is quite possible that Arnold Carruth did
profit unworthily by his beauty and engagingness,
albeit without calculation. He was so young, it
was monstrous to believe him capable of calculation,
of deliberate trading upon his assets of birth and
beauty and fascination. However, Johnny Trum-
bull, who was wide awake and a year older, was alive
to the situation.  He told Arnold Carruth, and
Arnold Carruth only, about Robin Hood and his
great scheme.

"You can help," said this wise Johnny; "you can
be in it, because nobody thinks you can be in any-
thing, on account of your wearing curls."

Arnold Carruth flushed and gave an angry tug
at one golden curl which the wind blew over a
shoulder. The two boys were in a secluded corner
of Madame's lawn, behind a clump of Japanese
cedars, during an intermission.

"I can't help it because I wear curls," declared
Arnold with angry shame.

"Who said you could? No need of getting mad."

"Mamma and Aunt Flora and grandmamma
won't let me have these old curls cut off," said
Arnold. "You needn't think I want to have curls
like a girl, Johnny Trumbull."

"Who said you did? And I know you don't like
to wear those short stockings, either."

"Like to!" Arnold gave a spiteful kick, first of
one half-bared, dimpled leg, then of the other.

"First thing you know I'll steal mamma's or Aunt
Flora's stockings and throw these in the furnace --
I will. Do you s'pose a feller wants to wear these
baby things? I guess not. Women are awful queer,
Johnny Trumbull. My mamma and my aunt Flora
are awful nice, but they are queer about some
things."

"Most women are queer," agreed Johnny, "but
my aunt Janet isn't as queer as some. Rather guess
if she saw me with curls like a little girl she'd cut
'em off herself."

"Wish she was my aunt," said Arnold Carruth
with a sigh. "A feller needs a woman like that till
he's grown up. Do you s'pose she'd cut off my curls
if I was to go to your house, Johnny?"

"I'm afraid she wouldn't think it was right unless
your mother said she might. She has to be real
careful about doing right, because my uncle Jonathan
used to preach, you know."

Arnold Carruth grinned savagely, as if he endured
pain. "Well, I s'pose I'll have to stand the curls and
little baby stockings awhile longer," said he. "What
was it you were going to tell me, Johnny?"

"I am going to tell you because I know you aren't
too good, if you do wear curls and little stockings."

"No, I ain't too good," declared Arnold Carruth,
proudly; "I ain't -- HONEST, Johnny."

"That's why I'm going to tell you. But if you
tell any of the other boys -- or girls --"

"Tell girls!" sniffed Arnold.

"If you tell anybody, I'll lick you."

"Guess I ain't afraid."

"Guess you'd be afraid to go home after you'd
been licked."

"Guess my mamma would give it to you."

"Run home and tell mamma you'd been whopped,
would you, then?"

Little Arnold, beautiful baby boy, straightened
himself with a quick remembrance that he was
born a man. "You know I wouldn't tell, Johnny
Trumbull."

"Guess you wouldn't. Well, here it is --" Johnny
spoke in emphatic whispers, Arnold's curly head close
to his mouth: "There are a good many things in
this town have got to be set right," said Johnny.

Little Arnold stared at him. Then fire shone in
his lovely blue eyes under the golden shadow of his
curls, a fire which had shone in the eyes of some
ancestors of his, for there was good fighting blood
in the Carruth family, as well as in the Trumbull,
although this small descendant did go about curled
and kissed and barelegged.

"How'll we begin?" said Arnold, in a strenuous
whisper.

"We've got to begin right away with Jim Sim-
mons's cats and kittens."

"With Jim Simmons's cats and kittens?" repeated
Arnold.

"That was what I said, exactly. We've got to
begin right there. It is an awful little beginning,
but I can't think of anything else. If you can, I'm
willing to listen."

"I guess I can't," admitted Arnold, helplessly.

"Of course we can't go around taking away money
from rich people and giving it to poor folks. One
reason is, most of the poor folks in this town are
lazy, and don't get money because they don't want
to work for it. And when they are not lazy, they
drink. If we gave rich people's money to poor
folks like that, we shouldn't do a mite of good.
The rich folks would be poor, and the poor folks
wouldn't stay rich; they would be lazier, and get
more drink. I don't see any sense in doing things
like that in this town. There are a few poor folks
I have been thinking we might take some money
for and do good, but not many."

"Who?" inquired Arnold Carruth, in awed tones.

"Well, there is poor old Mrs. Sam Little. She's
awful poor. Folks help her, I know, but she can't
be real pleased being helped. She'd rather have the
money herself. I have been wondering if we couldn't
get some of your father's money away and give it
to her, for one."

"Get away papa's money!"

"You don't mean to tell me you are as stingy as
that, Arnold Carruth?"

"I guess papa wouldn't like it."

"Of course he wouldn't. But that is not the point.
It is not what your father would like; it is what that
poor old lady would like."

It was too much for Arnold. He gaped at
Johnny.

"If you are going to be mean and stingy, we may
as well stop before we begin," said Johnny.

Then Arnold Carruth recovered himself. "Old
Mr. Webster Payne is awful poor," said he. "We
might take some of your father's money and give
it to him."

Johnny snorted, fairly snorted. "If," said he,
"you think my father keeps his money where we
can get it, you are mistaken, Arnold Carruth. My
father's money is all in papers that are not worth
much now and that he has to keep in the bank
till they are."

Arnold smiled hopefully. "Guess that's the way
my papa keeps HIS money."

"It's the way most rich people are mean enough
to," said Johnny, severely. "I don't care if it's
your father or mine, it's mean. And that's why
we've got to begin with Jim Simmons's cats and
kittens."

"Are you going to give old Mrs. Sam Little cats?"
inquired Arnold.

Johnny sniffed.   "Don't be silly," said he.
"Though I do think a nice cat with a few kittens
might cheer her up a little, and we could steal enough
milk, by getting up early and tagging after the milk-
man, to feed them. But I wasn't thinking of giving
her or old Mr. Payne cats and kittens. I wasn't
thinking of folks; I was thinking of all those poor
cats and kittens that Mr. Jim Simmons has and
doesn't half feed, and that have to go hunting
around folks' back doors in the rain, when cats hate
water, too, and pick things up that must be bad
for their stomachs, when they ought to have their
milk regularly in nice, clean saucers. No, Arnold
Carruth, what we have got to do is to steal Mr.
Jim Simmons's cats and get them in nice homes
where they can earn their living catching mice and
be well cared for."

"Steal cats?" said Arnold.

"Yes, steal cats, in order to do right," said Johnny
Trumbull, and his expression was heroic, even
exalted.

It was then that a sweet treble, faltering yet
exultant, rang in their ears.

"If," said the treble voice, "you are going to
steal dear little kitty cats and get nice homes for
them, I'm going to help."

The voice belonged to Lily Jennings, who had
stood on the other side of the Japanese cedars and
heard every word.

Both boys started in righteous wrath, but Arnold
Carruth was the angrier of the two. "Mean little
cat yourself, listening," said he. His curls seemed
to rise like a crest of rage.

Johnny, remembering some things, was not so
outspoken. "You hadn't any right to listen, Lily
Jennings," he said, with masculine severity.

"I didn't start to listen," said Lily. "I was look-
ing for cones on these trees. Miss Parmalee wanted
us to bring some object of nature into the class, and
I wondered whether I could find a queer Japanese
cone on one of these trees, and then I heard you
boys talking, and I couldn't help listening. You
spoke very loud, and I couldn't give up looking for
that cone. I couldn't find any, and I heard all
about the Simmonses' cats, and I know lots of other
cats that haven't got good homes, and -- I am going
to be in it."

"You AIN'T," declared Arnold Carruth.

"We can't have girls in it," said Johnny the mind-
ful, more politely.

"You've got to have me. You had better have
me, Johnny Trumbull," she added with meaning.

Johnny flinched. It was a species of blackmail,
but what could he do? Suppose Lily told how she
had hidden him -- him, Johnny Trumbull, the cham-
pion of the school -- in that empty baby-carriage!
He would have more to contend against than Arnold
Carruth with socks and curls. He did not think Lily
would tell. Somehow Lily, although a little, be-
frilled girl, gave an impression of having a knowledge
of a square deal almost as much as a boy would;
but what boy could tell with a certainty what such
an uncertain creature as a girl might or might not
do? Moreover, Johnny had a weakness, a hidden,
Spartanly hidden, weakness for Lily. He rather
wished to have her act as partner in his great enter-
prise. He therefore gruffly assented.

"All right," he said, "you can be in it. But just
you look out. You'll see what happens if you tell."

"She can't be in it; she's nothing but a girl,"
said Arnold Carruth, fiercely.

Lily Jennings lifted her chin and surveyed him
with queenly scorn. "And what are you?" said she.
"A little boy with curls and baby socks."

Arnold colored with shame and fury, and subsided.
"Mind you don't tell," he said, taking Johnny's cue.

"I sha'n't tell," replied Lily, with majesty. "But
you'll tell yourselves if you talk one side of trees
without looking on the other."

There was then only a few moments before
Madame's musical Japanese gong which announced
the close of intermission should sound, but three
determined souls in conspiracy can accomplish much
in a few moments. The first move was planned in
detail before that gong sounded, and the two boys
raced to the house, and Lily followed, carrying a toad-
stool, which she had hurriedly caught up from the
lawn for her object of nature to be taken into class.

It was a poisonous toadstool, and Lily was quite
a heroine in the class. That fact doubtless gave her
a more dauntless air when, after school, the two
boys caught up with her walking gracefully down
the road, flirting her skirts and now and then giving
her head a toss, which made her fluff of hair fly into
a golden foam under her daisy-trimmed straw hat.

"To-night," Johnny whispered, as he sped past.

"At half past nine, between your house and the
Simmonses'," replied Lily, without even looking at
him. She was a past-mistress of dissimulation.

Lily's mother had guests at dinner that night,
and the guests remarked sometimes, within the little
girl's hearing, what a darling she was.

"She never gives me a second's anxiety," Lily's
mother whispered to a lady beside her. "You can-
not imagine what a perfectly good, dependable child
she is."

"Now my Christina is a good child in the grain,"
said the lady, "but she is full of mischief. I never
can tell what Christina will do next."

"I can always tell," said Lily's mother, in a voice
of maternal triumph.

"Now only the other night, when I thought
Christina was in bed, that absurd child got up and
dressed and ran over to see her aunt Bella. Tom
came home with her, and of course there was nothing
very bad about it. Christina was very bright; she
said, 'Mother, you never told me I must not get up
and go to see Aunt Bella,' which was, of course,
true. I could not gainsay that."

"I cannot," said Lily's mother, "imagine my
Lily's doing such a thing."

If Lily had heard that last speech of her mother's,
whom she dearly loved, she might have wavered.
That pathetic trust in herself might have caused her
to justify it. But she had finished her dinner and
had been excused, and was undressing for bed, with
the firm determination to rise betimes and dress
and join Johnny Trumbull and Arnold Carruth.
Johnny had the easiest time of them all. He simply
had to bid his aunt Janet good night and have the
watch wound, and take a fleeting glimpse of his
mother at her desk and his father in his office, and
go whistling to his room, and sit in the summer
darkness and wait until the time came.

Arnold Carruth had the hardest struggle. His
mother had an old school friend visiting her, and
Arnold, very much dressed up, with his curls falling
in a shining fleece upon a real lace collar, had to be
shown off and show off. He had to play one little
piece which he had learned upon the piano. He had
to recite a little poem. He had to be asked how old
he was, and if he liked to go to school, and how
many teachers he had, and if he loved them, and
if he loved his little mates, and which of them he
loved best; and he had to be asked if he loved his
aunt Dorothy, who was the school friend and not his
aunt at all, and would he not like to come and live
with her, because she had not any dear little boy;
and he was obliged to submit to having his curls
twisted around feminine fingers, and to being kissed
and hugged, and a whole chapter of ordeals, before
he was finally in bed, with his mother's kiss moist
upon his lips, and free to assert himself.

That night Arnold Carruth realized himself as
having an actual horror of his helpless state of pam-
pered childhood. The man stirred in the soul of the
boy, and it was a little rebel with sulky pout of lips
and frown of childish brows who stole out of bed,
got into some queer clothes, and crept down the
back stairs. He heard his aunt Dorothy, who was
not his aunt, singing an Italian song in the parlor,
he heard the clink of silver and china from the
butler's pantry, where the maids were washing the
dinner dishes. He smelt his father's cigar, and he
gave a little leap of joy on the grass of the lawn.
At last he was out at night alone, and -- he wore long
stockings! That noon he had secreted a pair of
his mother's toward that end. When he came home
to luncheon he pulled them out of the darning-bag,
which he had spied through a closet door that had
been left ajar. One of the stockings was green silk,
and the other was black, and both had holes in
them, but all that mattered was the length. Arnold
wore also his father's riding-breeches, which came
over his shoes and which were enormously large,
and one of his father's silk shirts. He had resolved
to dress consistently for such a great occasion. His
clothes hampered him, but he felt happy as he sped
clumsily down the road.

However, both Johnny Trumbull and Lily Jen-
nings, who were waiting for him at the rendezvous,
were startled by his appearance. Both began to
run, Johnny pulling Lily after him by the hand,
but Arnold's cautious hallo arrested them. Johnny
and Lily returned slowly, peering through the dark-
ness.

"It's me," said Arnold, with gay disregard of
grammar.

"You looked," said Lily, "like a real fat old man.
What HAVE you got on, Arnold Carruth?"

Arnold slouched before his companions, ridiculous
but triumphant. He hitched up a leg of the riding-
breeches and displayed a long, green silk stocking.
Both Johnny and Lily doubled up with laughter.

"What you laughing at?" inquired Arnold, crossly.

"Oh, nothing at all," said Lily. "Only you do
look like a scarecrow broken loose. Doesn't he,
Johnny?"

"I am going home," stated Arnold with dignity.
He turned, but Johnny caught him in his little iron
grip.

"Oh, shucks, Arnold Carruth!" said he. "Don't
be a baby. Come on." And Arnold Carruth with
difficulty came on.

People in the village, as a rule, retired early. Many
lights were out when the affair began, many went
out while it was in progress. All three of the band
steered as clear of lighted houses as possible, and
dodged behind trees and hedges when shadowy
figures appeared on the road or carriage-wheels were
heard in the distance. At their special destination
they were sure to be entirely safe. Old Mr. Peter
Van Ness always retired very early. To be sure,
he did not go to sleep until late, and read in bed,
but his room was in the rear of the house on the
second floor, and all the windows, besides, were
dark. Mr. Peter Van Ness was a very wealthy
elderly gentleman, very benevolent. He had given
the village a beautiful stone church with memorial
windows, a soldiers' monument, a park, and a home
for aged couples, called "The Van Ness Home."
Mr. Van Ness lived alone with the exception of a
housekeeper and a number of old, very well-disci-
plined servants. The servants always retired early,
and Mr. Van Ness required the house to be quiet for
his late reading. He was a very studious old gentle-
man.

To the Van Ness house, set back from the street
in the midst of a well-kept lawn, the three repaired,
but not as noiselessly as they could have wished. In
fact, a light flared in an up-stairs window, which
was wide open, and one woman's voice was heard
in conclave with another.

"I should think," said the first, "that the lawn
was full of cats. Did you ever hear such a mewing,
Jane?"

That was the housekeeper's voice. The three,
each of whom carried a squirming burlap potato-bag
from the Trumbull cellar, stood close to a clump
of stately pines full of windy songs, and trem-
bled.

"It do sound like cats, ma'am," said another voice,
which was Jane's, the maid, who had brought Mrs.
Meeks, the housekeeper, a cup of hot water and
peppermint, because her dinner had disagreed with
her.

"Just listen," said Mrs. Meeks.

"Yes, ma'am, I should think there was hundreds
of cats and little kittens."

"I am so afraid Mr. Van Ness will be disturbed."

"Yes, ma'am."

"You might go out and look, Jane."

"Oh, ma'am, they might be burglars!"

"How can they be burglars when they are cats?"
demanded Mrs. Meeks, testily.

Arnold Carruth snickered, and Johnny on one side,
and Lily on the other, prodded him with an elbow.
They were close under the window.

"Burglars is up to all sorts of queer tricks, ma'am,"
said Jane. "They may mew like cats to tell one
another what door to go in."

"Jane, you talk like an idiot," said Mrs. Meeks.
"Burglars talking like cats! Who ever heard of such
a thing? It sounds right under that window. Open
my closet door and get those heavy old shoes and
throw them out."

It was an awful moment. The three dared not
move. The cats and kittens in the bags -- not so
many, after all -- seemed to have turned into multi-
plication-tables. They were positively alarming in
their determination to get out, their wrath with one
another, and their vociferous discontent with the
whole situation.

"I can't hold my bag much longer," said poor little
Arnold Carruth.

"Hush up, cry-baby!" whispered Lily, fiercely,
in spite of a clawing paw emerging from her own
bag and threatening her bare arm.

Then came the shoes. One struck Arnold squarely
on the shoulder, nearly knocking him down and
making him lose hold of his bag. The other struck
Lily's bag, and conditions became worse; but she
held on despite a scratch. Lily had pluck.

Then Jane's voice sounded very near, as she leaned
out of the window. "I guess they have went,
ma'am," said she. "I seen something run."

"I can hear them," said Mrs. Meeks, queru-
lously.

"I seen them run," persisted Jane, who was tired
and wished to be gone.

"Well, close that window, anyway, for I know I
hear them, even if they have gone," said Mrs. Meeks.
The three heard with relief the window slammed
down.

The light flashed out, and simultaneously Lily
Jennings and Johnny Trumbull turned indignantly
upon Arnold Carruth.

"There, you have gone and let all those poor cats
go," said Johnny.

"And spoilt everything," said Lily.

Arnold rubbed his shoulder. "You would have
let go if you had been hit right on the shoulder
by a great shoe," said he, rather loudly.

"Hush up!" said Lily. "I wouldn't have let my
cats go if I had been killed by a shoe; so there."

"Serves us right for taking a boy with curls," said
Johnny Trumbull.

But he spoke unadvisedly. Arnold Carruth was
no match whatever for Johnny Trumbull, and had
never been allowed the honor of a combat with him;
but surprise takes even a great champion at a dis-
advantage. Arnold turned upon Johnny like a flash,
out shot a little white fist, up struck a dimpled leg
clad in cloth and leather, and down sat Johnny
Trumbull; and, worse, open flew his bag, and there
was a yowling exodus.

"There go your cats, too, Johnny Trumbull,"
said Lily, in a perfectly calm whisper. At that mo-
ment both boys, victor and vanquished, felt a simul-
taneous throb of masculine wrath at Lily. Who was
she to gloat over the misfortunes of men? But retri-
bution came swiftly to Lily. That viciously claw-
ing little paw shot out farther, and there was a limit
to Spartanism in a little girl born so far from that
heroic land. Lily let go of her bag and with diffi-
culty stifled a shriek of pain.

"Whose cats are gone now?" demanded Johnny,
rising.

"Yes, whose cats are gone now?" said Arnold.

Then Johnny promptly turned upon him and
knocked him down and sat on him.

Lily looked at them, standing, a stately little
figure in the darkness. "I am going home," said
she. "My mother does not allow me to go with
fighting boys."

Johnny rose, and so did Arnold, whimpering
slightly. His shoulder ached considerably.

"He knocked me down," said Johnny.

Even as he whimpered and as he suffered, Arnold
felt a thrill of triumph. "Always knew I could if I
had a chance," said he.

"You couldn't if I had been expecting it," said
Johnny.

"Folks get knocked down when they ain't ex-
pecting it most of the time," declared Arnold, with
more philosophy than he realized.

"I don't think it makes much difference about the
knocking down," said Lily. "All those poor cats
and kittens that we were going to give a good home,
where they wouldn't be starved, have got away,
and they will run straight back to Mr. Jim Sim-
mons's."

"If they haven't any more sense than to run back
to a place where they don't get enough to eat and
are kicked about by a lot of children, let them run,"
said Johnny.

"That's so," said Arnold. "I never did see what
we were doing such a thing for, anyway -- stealing
Mr. Simmons's cats and giving them to Mr. Van
Ness."

It was the girl alone who stood by her guns of
righteousness. "I saw and I see," she declared, with
dangerously loud emphasis. "It was only our duty
to try to rescue poor helpless animals who don't
know any better than to stay where they are badly
treated. And Mr. Van Ness has so much money he
doesn't know what to do with it; he would have been
real pleased to give those cats a home and buy milk
and liver for them. But it's all spoiled now. I will
never undertake to do good again, with a lot of boys
in the way, as long as I live; so there!" Lily turned
about.

"Going to tell your mother!" said Johnny, with
scorn which veiled anxiety.

"No, I'm NOT. I don't tell tales."

Lily marched off, and in her wake went Johnny
and Arnold, two poor little disillusioned would-be
knights of old romance in a wretchedly common-
place future, not far enough from their horizons for
any glamour.

They went home, and of the three Johnny Trum-
bull was the only one who was discovered. For him
his aunt Janet lay in wait and forced a confession.
She listened grimly, but her eyes twinkled.

"You have learned to fight, John Trumbull," said
she, when he had finished. "Now the very next
thing you have to learn, and make yourself worthy
of your grandfather Trumbull, is not to be a fool."

"Yes, Aunt Janet," said Johnny.

The next noon, when he came home from school,
old Maria, who had been with the family ever since
he could remember and long before, called him into
the kitchen. There, greedily lapping milk from a
saucer, were two very lean, tall kittens.

"See those nice little tommy-cats," said Maria,
beaming upon Johnny, whom she loved and whom
she sometimes fancied deprived of boyish joys.
"Your aunt Janet sent me over to the Simmonses'
for them this morning. They are overrun with cats
-- such poor, shiftless folks always be -- and you can
have them. We shall have to watch for a little while
till they get wonted, so they won't run home."

Johnny gazed at the kittens, fast distending with
the new milk, and felt presumably much as dear
Robin Hood may have felt after one of his successful
raids in the fair, poetic past.

"Pretty, ain't they?" said Maria. "They have
drank up a whole saucer of milk. 'Most starved. I
s'pose."

Johnny gathered up the two forlorn kittens and
sat down in a kitchen chair, with one on each shoul-
der, hard, boyish cheeks pressed against furry, pur-
ring sides, and the little fighting Cock of the Walk
felt his heart glad and tender with the love of the
strong for the weak.





DANIEL AND LITTLE DAN'L





DANIEL AND LITTLE DAN'L

THE Wise homestead dated back more than a
century, yet it had nothing imposing about it
except its site. It was a simple, glaringly white cot-
tage. There was a center front door with two win-
dows on each side; there was a low slant of roof,
pierced by unpicturesque dormers. On the left of
the house was an ell, which had formerly been used
as a shoemaker's shop, but now served as a kitchen.
In the low attic of the ell was stored the shoemaker's
bench, whereon David Wise's grandfather had sat
for nearly eighty years of working days; after him
his eldest son, Daniel's father, had occupied the same
hollow seat of patient toil. Daniel had sat there for
twenty-odd years, then had suddenly realized both
the lack of necessity and the lack of customers, since
the great shoe-plant had been built down in the vil-
lage. Then Daniel had retired -- although he did
not use that expression. Daniel said to his friends
and his niece Dora that he had "quit work." But
he told himself, without the least bitterness, that
work had quit him.

After Daniel had retired, his one physiological
peculiarity assumed enormous proportions. It had
always been with him, but steady work had held it,
to a great extent, at bay. Daniel was a moral
coward before physical conditions. He was as one
who suffers, not so much from agony of the flesh as
from agony of the mind induced thereby. Daniel
was a coward before one of the simplest, most in-
evitable happenings of earthly life. He was a coward
before summer heat. All winter he dreaded summer.
Summer poisoned the spring for him. Only during
the autumn did he experience anything of peace.
Summer was then over, and between him and another
summer stretched the blessed perspective of winter.
Then Daniel Wise drew a long breath and looked
about him, and spelled out the beauty of the earth
in his simple primer of understanding. Daniel had
in his garden behind the house a prolific grape-vine.
He ate the grapes, full of the savor of the dead sum-
mer, with the gusto of a poet who can at last enjoy
triumph over his enemy.

Possibly it was the vein of poetry in Daniel which
made him a coward -- which made him so vulnerable.
During the autumn he reveled in the tints of the
landscape which his sitting-room windows com-
manded. There were many maples and oaks. Day
by day the roofs of the houses in the village be-
came more evident, as the maples shed their crimson
and gold and purple rags of summer. The oaks re-
mained, great shaggy masses of dark gold and burn-
ing russet; later they took on soft hues, making
clearer the blue firmament between the boughs.
Daniel watched the autumn trees with pure delight.
"He will go to-day," he said of a flaming maple
after a night of frost which had crisped the white
arches of the grass in his dooryard. All day he
sat and watched the maple cast its glory, and did
not bother much with his simple meals. The Wise
house was erected on three terraces. Always through
the dry summer the grass was burned to an ugly
negation of color. Later, when rain came, the grass
was a brilliant green, patched with rosy sorrel and
golden stars of arnica. Then later still came the
diamond brilliance of the frost. So dry were the
terraces in summer-time that no flowers would
flourish. When Daniel's mother had come to the
house as a bride she had planted under a window a
blush-rose bush, but always the blush-roses were
few and covered with insects. It was not until the
autumn, when it was time for the flowers to die, that
the sorrel blessing of waste lands flushed rosily and
the arnica showed its stars of slender threads of
gold, and there might even be a slight glimpse of
purple aster and a dusty spray or two of goldenrod.
Then Daniel did not shrink from the sight of the
terraces. In summer-time the awful negative glare
of them under the afternoon sun maddened him.

In winter he often visited his brother John in
the village. He was very fond of John, and John's
wife, and their only daughter, Dora. When John
died, and later his wife, he would have gone to live
with Dora, but she married. Then her husband also
died, and Dora took up dressmaking, supporting
herself and her delicate little girl-baby.  Daniel
adored this child. She had been named for him,
although her mother had been aghast before the propo-
sition. "Name a girl Daniel, uncle!" she had cried.

"She is going to have what I own after I have
done with it, anyway," declared Daniel, gazing with
awe and rapture at the tiny flannel bundle in his
niece's arms. "That won't make any difference, but
I do wish you could make up your mind to call her
after me, Dora."

Dora Lee was soft-hearted. She named her girl-
baby Daniel, and called her Danny, which was not,
after all, so bad, and her old uncle loved the child
as if she had been his own. Little Daniel -- he always
called her Daniel, or, rather, "Dan'l" -- was the only
reason for his descending into the village on summer
days when the weather was hot. Daniel, when he
visited the village in summer-time, wore always a
green leaf inside his hat and carried an umbrella
and a palm-leaf fan. This caused the village boys to
shout, "Hullo, grandma!" after him. Daniel, being
a little hard of hearing, was oblivious, but he would
have been in any case. His whole mind was con-
centrated in getting along that dusty glare of street,
stopping at the store for a paper bag of candy, and
finally ending in Dora's little dark parlor, holding his
beloved namesake on his knee, watching her bliss-
fully suck a barley stick while he waved his palm-
leaf fan. Dora would be fitting gowns in the next
room. He would hear the hum of feminine chatter
over strictly feminine topics. He felt very much
aloof, even while holding the little girl on his knee.
Daniel had never married -- had never even h ad a sweet-
heart. The marriageable women he had seen had not
been of the type to attract a dreamer like Daniel Wise.
Many of those women thought him "a little off."

Dora Lee, his niece, privately wondered if her
uncle had his full allotment of understanding. He
seemed much more at home with her little daughter
than with herself, and Dora considered herself a
very good business woman, with possibly an unusual
endowment of common sense. She was such a good
business woman that when she died suddenly she
left her child with quite a sum in the bank, besides
the house. Daniel did not hesitate for a moment.
He engaged Miss Sarah Dean for a housekeeper,
and took the little girl (hardly more than a baby)
to his own home. Dora had left a will, in which
she appointed Daniel guardian in spite of her doubt
concerning his measure of understanding. There was
much comment in the village when Daniel took
his little namesake to live in his lonely house on
the terrace. "A man and an old maid to bring up
that poor child!" they said.  But Daniel called
Dr. Trumbull to his support. "It is much better for
that delicate child to be out of this village, which
drains the south hill," Dr. Trumbull declared.
"That child needs pure air. It is hot enough in
summer all around here, and hot enough at Daniel's,
but the air is pure there."

There was no gossip about Daniel and Miss
Sarah Dean. Gossip would have seemed about as
foolish concerning him and a dry blade of field-grass.
Sarah Dean looked like that. She wore rusty black
gowns, and her gray-blond hair was swept curtain-
wise over her ears on either side of her very thin,
mildly severe wedge of a face. Sarah was a notable
housekeeper and a good cook. She could make an
endless variety of cakes and puddings and pies, and
her biscuits were marvels. Daniel had long catered
for himself, and a rasher of bacon, with an egg,
suited him much better for supper than hot biscuits,
preserves, and five kinds of cake. Still, he did not
complain, and did not understand that Sarah's fare
was not suitable for the child, until Dr. Trumbull
told him so.

"Don't you let that child live on that kind of food
if you want her to live at all," said Dr. Trumbull.
"Lord! what are the women made of, and the men
they feed, for that matter? Why, Daniel, there are
many people in this place, and hard-working people,
too, who eat a quantity of food, yet don't get enough
nourishment for a litter of kittens."

"What shall I do?" asked Daniel in a puzzled way.

"Do? You can cook a beefsteak yourself, can't
you? Sarah Dean would fry one as hard as sole-
leather."

"Yes, I can cook a beefsteak real nice," said
Daniel.

"Do it, then; and cook some chops, too, and
plenty of eggs."

"I don't exactly hanker after quite so much sweet
stuff," said Daniel. "I wonder if Sarah's feelings
will be hurt."

"It is much better for feelings to be hurt than
stomachs," declared Dr. Trumbull, "but Sarah's
feelings will not be hurt. I know her. She is a wiry
woman. Give her a knock and she springs back
into place. Don't worry about her, Daniel."

When Daniel went home that night he carried a
juicy steak, and he cooked it, and he and little Dan'1
had a square meal. Sarah refused the steak with a
slight air of hauteur, but she behaved very well.
When she set away her untasted layer-cakes and
pies and cookies, she eyed them somewhat anxiously.
Her standard of values seemed toppling before her
mental vision. "They will starve to death if they
live on such victuals as beefsteak, instead of good
nourishing hot biscuits and cake," she thought.
After the supper dishes were cleared away she went
into the sitting-room where Daniel Wise sat beside
a window, waiting in a sort of stern patience for a
whiff of air. It was a very close evening. The sun
was red in the low west, but a heaving sea of mist was
rising over the lowlands.

Sarah sat down opposite Daniel. "Close, ain't
it?" said she. She began knitting her lace edging.

"Pretty close," replied Daniel. He spoke with
an effect of forced politeness. Although he had such
a horror of extreme heat, he was always chary of
boldly expressing his mind concerning it, for he had
a feeling that he might be guilty of blasphemy, since
he regarded the weather as being due to an Almighty
mandate. Therefore, although he suffered, he was
extremely polite.

"It is awful up-stairs in little Dan'l's room," said
Sarah. "I have got all the windows open except the
one that's right on the bed, and I told her she needn't
keep more than the sheet and one comfortable over
her."

Daniel looked anxious. "Children ain't ever over-
come when they are in bed, in the house, are they?"

"Land, no! I never heard of such a thing. And,
anyway, little Dan'l's so thin it ain't likely she feels
the heat as much as some."

"I hope she don't."

Daniel continued to sit hunched up on himself,
gazing with a sort of mournful irritation out of the
window upon the landscape over which the misty
shadows vaguely wavered.

Sarah knitted. She could knit in the dark. After
a while she rose and said she guessed she would go
to bed, as to-morrow was her sweeping-day.

Sarah went, and Daniel sat alone.

Presently a little pale figure stole to him through
the dusk -- the child, in her straight white night-
gown, padding softly on tiny naked feet.

"Is that you, Dan'l?"

"Yes, Uncle Dan'l."

"Is it too hot to sleep up in your room?"

"I didn't feel so very hot, Uncle Dan'l, but skeet-
ers were biting me, and a great big black thing just
flew in my window!"

"A bat, most likely."

"A bat!" Little Dan'l shuddered. She began a
little stifled wail. "I'm afeard of bats," she la-
mented.

Daniel gathered the tiny creature up. "You can
jest set here with Uncle Dan'l," said he. "It is jest
a little cooler here, I guess. Once in a while there
comes a little whiff of wind."

"Won't any bats come?"

"Lord, no! Your Uncle Dan'l won't let any bats
come within a gun-shot."

The little creature settled down contentedly in the
old man's lap. Her fair, thin locks fell over his
shirt-sleeved arm, her upturned profile was sweetly
pure and clear even in the dusk. She was so deli-
cately small that he might have been holding a fairy,
from the slight roundness of the childish limbs and
figure. Poor little girl! -- Dan'1 was much too small
and thin. Old man Daniel gazed down at her
anxiously.

"Jest as soon as the nice fall weather comes,"
said he, "uncle is going to take you down to the
village real often, and you can get acquainted with
some other nice little girls and play with them, and
that will do uncle's little Dan'l good."

"I saw little Lucy Rose," piped the child, "and
she looked at me real pleasant, and Lily Jennings
wore a pretty dress. Would they play with me,
uncle?"

"Of course they would. You don't feel quite so
hot, here, do you?"

"I wasn't so hot, anyway; I was afeard of bats."

"There ain't any bats here."

"And skeeters."

"Uncle don't believe there's any skeeters, neither."

"I don't hear any sing," agreed little Dan'l in a
weak voice. Very soon she was fast asleep. The
old man sat holding her, and loving her with a simple
crystalline intensity which was fairly heavenly. He
himself almost disregarded the heat, being raised
above it by sheer exaltation of spirit. All the love
which had lain latent in his heart leaped to life be-
fore the helplessness of this little child in his arms.
He realized himself as much greater and of more
importance upon the face of the earth than he had
ever been before. He became paternity incarnate
and superblessed. It was a long time before he car-
ried the little child back to her room and laid her,
still as inert with sleep as a lily, upon her bed. He
bent over her with a curious waving motion of his
old shoulders as if they bore wings of love and pro-
tection; then he crept back down-stairs.

On nights like that he did not go to bed. All the
bedrooms were under the slant of the roof and were
hot. He preferred to sit until dawn beside his open
window, and doze when he could, and wait with
despairing patience for the infrequent puffs of cool
air breathing blessedly of wet swamp places, which,
even when the burning sun arose, would only show
dewy eyes of cool reflection. Daniel Wise, as he sat
there through the sultry night, even prayed for
courage, as a devout sentinel might have prayed
at his post. The imagination of the deserter was
not in the man. He never even dreamed of appro-
priating to his own needs any portion of his savings,
and going for a brief respite to the deep shadows of
mountainous places, or to a cool coast, where the
great waves broke in foam upon the sand, breathing
out the mighty saving breath of the sea. It never
occurred to him that he could do anything but re-
main at his post and suffer in body and soul and
mind, and not complain.

The next morning was terrible. The summer had
been one of unusually fervid heat, but that one day
was its climax. David went panting up-stairs to
his room at dawn. He did not wish Sarah Dean to
know that he had sat up all night. He opened his
bed, tidily, as was his wont. Through living alone
he had acquired many of the habits of an orderly
housewife. He went down-stairs, and Sarah was in
the kitchen.

"It is a dreadful hot day," said she as Daniel
approached the sink to wash his face and hands.

"It does seem a little warm," admitted Daniel,
with his studied air of politeness with respect to the
weather as an ordinance of God.

"Warm!" echoed Sarah Dean. Her thin face
blazed a scarlet wedge between the sleek curtains
of her dank hair; perspiration stood on her triangle
of forehead. "It is the hottest day I ever knew!"
she said, defiantly, and there was open rebellion in
her tone.

"It IS sort of warmish, I rather guess," said
Daniel.

After breakfast, old Daniel announced his in-
tention of taking little Dan'l out for a walk.

At that Sarah Dean fairly exploded. "Be you
gone clean daft, Dan'l?" said she. "Don't you know
that it actually ain't safe to take out such a delicate
little thing as that on such a day?"

"Dr. Trumbull said to take her outdoors for a
walk every day, rain or shine," returned Daniel,
obstinately.

"But Dr. Trumbull didn't say to take her out if
it rained fire and brimstone, I suppose," said Sarah
Dean, viciously.

Daniel looked at her with mild astonishment.

"It is as much as that child's life is worth to take
her out such a day as this," declared Sarah, viciously.

"Dr. Trumbull said to take no account of the
weather," said Daniel with stubborn patience, "and
we will walk on the shady side of the road, and
go to Bradley's Brook. It's always a little cool
there."

"If she faints away before you get there, you
bring her right home," said Sarah. She was almost
ferocious. "Just because YOU don't feel the heat,
to take out that little pindlin' girl such a day!" she
exclaimed.

"Dr. Trumbull said to," persisted Daniel, al-
though he looked a little troubled. Sarah Dean
did not dream that, for himself, Daniel Wise would
have preferred facing an army with banners to going
out under that terrible fusillade of sun-rays. She
did not dream of the actual heroism which actuated
him when he set out with little Dan'l, holding his
big umbrella over her little sunbonneted head and
waving in his other hand a palm-leaf fan.

Little Dan'l danced with glee as she went out of
the yard. The small, anemic creature did not feel
the heat except as a stimulant. Daniel had to keep
charging her to walk slowly. "Don't go so fast,
little Dan'l, or you'll get overhet, and then what
will Mis' Dean say?" he continually repeated.

Little Dan'l's thin, pretty face peeped up at him
from between the sides of her green sunbonnet. She
pointed one dainty finger at a cloud of pale yellow
butterflies in the field beside which they were walk-
ing.  "Want to chase flutterbies," she chirped.
Little Dan'l had a fascinating way of misplacing
her consonants in long words.

"No; you'll get overhet. You just walk along
slow with Uncle Dan'l, and pretty soon we'll come
to the pretty brook," said Daniel.

"Where the lagon-dries live?" asked little Dan'l,
meaning dragon-flies.

"Yes," said Daniel. He was conscious, as he
spoke, of increasing waves of thready black floating
before his eyes. They had floated since dawn, but
now they were increasing. Some of the time he
could hardly see the narrow sidewalk path between
the dusty meadowsweet and hardhack bushes, since
those floating black threads wove together into a
veritable veil before him. At such times he walked
unsteadily, and little Dan'l eyed him curiously.

"Why don't you walk the way you always do?"
she queried.

"Uncle Dan'l can't see jest straight, somehow,"
replied the old man; "guess it's because it's rather
warm."

It was in truth a day of terror because of the heat.
It was one of those days which break records, which
live in men's memories as great catastrophes, which
furnish head-lines for newspapers, and are alluded
to with shudders at past sufferings. It was one of
those days which seem to forecast the Dreadful
Day of Revelation wherein no shelter may be found
from the judgment of the fiery firmament. On that
day men fell in their tracks and died, or were rushed
to hospitals to be succored as by a miracle. And on
that day the poor old man who had all his life feared
and dreaded the heat as the most loathly happening
of earth, walked afield for love of the little child.
As Daniel went on the heat seemed to become pal-
pable -- something which could actually be seen.
There was now a thin, gaseous horror over the blaz-
ing sky, which did not temper the heat, but in-
creased it, giving it the added torment of steam.
The clogging moisture seemed to brood over the
accursed earth, like some foul bird with deadly
menace in wings and beak.

Daniel walked more and more unsteadily. Once
he might have fallen had not the child thrown one
little arm around a bending knee. "You 'most
tumbled down. Uncle Dan'l," said she. Her little
voice had a surprised and frightened note in it.

"Don't you be scared," gasped Daniel; "we
have got 'most to the brook; then we'll be all right.
Don't you be scared, and -- you walk real slow and
not get overhet."

The brook was near, and it was time. Daniel
staggered under the trees beside which the little
stream trickled over its bed of stones. It was not
much of a brook at best, and the drought had caused
it to lose much of its life. However, it was still
there, and there were delicious little hollows of cool-
ness between the stones over which it flowed, and
large trees stood about with their feet rooted in the
blessed damp. Then Daniel sank down. He tried to
reach a hand to the water, but could not. The
black veil had woven a compact mass before his
eyes. There was a terrible throbbing in his head,
but his arms were numb.

Little Dan'l stood looking at him, and her lip
quivered.  With a mighty effort Daniel cleared
away the veil and saw the piteous baby face. "Take
-- Uncle Dan'l's hat and -- fetch him -- some water,"
he gasped. "Don't go too -- close and -- tumble in."

The child obeyed. Daniel tried to take the drip-
ping hat, but failed. Little Dan'l was wise enough
to pour the water over the old man's head, but she
commenced to weep, the pitiful, despairing wail of
a child who sees failing that upon which she has
leaned for support.

Daniel rallied again. The water on his head gave
him momentary relief, but more than anything else
his love for the child nerved him to effort.

"Listen, little Dan'l," he said, and his voice
sounded in his own ears like a small voice of a soul
thousands of miles away. "You take the -- um-
brella, and -- you take the fan, and you go real slow,
so you don't get overhet, and you tell Mis' Dean,
and --"

Then old Daniel's tremendous nerve, that he had
summoned for the sake of love, failed him, and he
sank back. He was quite unconscious -- his face,
staring blindly up at the terrible sky between the
trees, was to little Dan'l like the face of a stranger.
She gave one cry, more like the yelp of a trodden
animal than a child's voice. Then she took the open
umbrella and sped away. The umbrella bobbed
wildly -- nothing could be seen of poor little Dan'l
but her small, speeding feet. She wailed loudly all
the way.

She was half-way home when, plodding along in
a cloud of brown dust, a horse appeared in the road.
The horse wore a straw bonnet and advanced very
slowly. He drew a buggy, and in the buggy were
Dr. Trumbull and Johnny, his son. He had called
at Daniel's to see the little girl, and, on being told
that they had gone to walk, had said something
under his breath and turned his horse's head down
the road.

"When we meet them, you must get out, Johnny,"
he said, "and I will take in that poor old man and
that baby. I wish I could put common sense in
every bottle of medicine. A day like this!"

Dr. Trumbull exclaimed when he saw the great
bobbing black umbrella and heard the wails. The
straw-bonneted horse stopped abruptly. Dr. Trum-
bull leaned out of the buggy. "Who are you?" he
demanded.

"Uncle Dan'l is gone," shrieked the child.

"Gone where? What do you mean?"

"He -- tumbled right down, and then he was --
somebody else. He ain't there."

"Where is 'there'? Speak up quick!"

"The brook -- Uncle Dan'l went away at the
brook."

Dr. Trumbull acted swiftly. He gave Johnny a
push. "Get out," he said. "Take that baby into
Jim Mann's house there, and tell Mrs. Mann to
keep her in the shade and look out for her, and you
tell Jim, if he hasn't got his horse in his farm-wagon,
to look lively and harness her in and put all the ice
they've got in the house in the wagon. Hurry!"

Johnny was over the wheel before his father had
finished speaking, and Jim Mann just then drew up
alongside in his farm-wagon.

"What's to pay?" he inquired, breathless. He
was a thin, sinewy man, scantily clad in cotton
trousers and a shirt wide open at the breast. Green
leaves protruded from under the brim of his tilted
straw hat.

"Old Daniel Wise is overcome by the heat," an-
swered Dr. Trumbull. "Put all the ice you have
in the house in your wagon, and come along. I'll
leave my horse and buggy here. Your horse is faster."

Presently the farm-wagon clattered down the road,
dust-hidden behind a galloping horse. Mrs. Jim
Mann, who was a loving mother of children, was
soothing little Dan'l. Johnny Trumbull watched
at the gate. When the wagon returned he ran out
and hung on behind, while the strong, ungainly
farm-horse galloped to the house set high on the
sun-baked terraces.

When old Daniel revived he found himself in the
best parlor, with ice all about him. Thunder was
rolling overhead and hail clattered on the windows.
A sudden storm, the heat-breaker, had come up and
the dreadful day was vanquished. Daniel looked
up and smiled a vague smile of astonishment at Dr.
Trumbull and Sarah Dean; then his eyes wandered
anxiously about.

"The child is all right," said Dr. Trumbull;
"don't you worry, Daniel. Mrs. Jim Mann is tak-
ing care of her. Don't you try to talk. You didn't
exactly have a sunstroke, but the heat was too much
for you."

But Daniel spoke, in spite of the doctor's man-
date. "The heat," said he, in a curiously clear
voice," ain't never goin' to be too much for me again."

"Don't you talk, Daniel," repeated Dr. Trum-
bull. "You've always been nervous about the heat.
Maybe you won't be again, but keep still. When I
told you to take that child out every day I didn't
mean when the world was like Sodom and Gomor-
rah. Thank God, it will be cooler now."

Sarah Dean stood beside the doctor. She looked
pale and severe, but adequate. She did not even
state that she had urged old Daniel not to go out.
There was true character in Sarah Dean.

The weather that summer was an unexpected
quantity. Instead of the day after the storm being
cool, it was hot. However, old Daniel, after his re-
covery, insisted on going out of doors with little
Dan'l after breakfast. The only concession which
he would make to Sarah Dean, who was fairly fran-
tic with anxiety, was that he would merely go down
the road as far as the big elm-tree, that he would sit
down there, and let the child play about within sight.

"You'll be brought home agin, sure as preachin',"
said Sarah Dean, "and if you're brought home ag'in,
you won't get up ag'in."

Old Daniel laughed. "Now don't you worry,
Sarah," said he. "I'll set down under that big ellum
and keep cool."

Old Daniel, at Sarah's earnest entreaties, took a
palm-leaf fan. But he did not use it. He sat peace-
fully under the cool trail of the great elm all the
forenoon, while little Dan'l played with her doll.
The child was rather languid after her shock of the
day before, and not disposed to run about. Also,
she had a great sense of responsibility about the old
man. Sarah Dean had privately charged her not
to let Uncle Daniel get "overhet." She continually
glanced up at him with loving, anxious, baby eyes.

"Be you overhet. Uncle Dan'l?" she would ask.

"No, little Dan'l, uncle ain't a mite overhet,"
the old man would assure her. Now and then little
Dan'l left her doll, climbed into the old man's lap,
and waved the palm-leaf fan before his face.

Old Daniel Wise loved her so that he seemed, to
himself, fairly alight with happiness. He made up his
mind that he would find some little girl in the village
to come now and then and play with little Dan'l.
In the cool of that evening he stole out of the back
door, covertly, lest Sarah Dean discover him, and
walked slowly to the rector's house in the village.
The rector's wife was sitting on her cool, vine-shaded
veranda. She was alone, and Daniel was glad. He
asked her if the little girl who had come to live with
her, Content Adams, could not come the next after-
noon and see little Dan'l. "Little Dan'l had ought
to see other children once in a while, and Sarah Dean
makes real nice cookies," he stated, pleadingly.

Sally Patterson laughed good-naturedly. "Of
course she can, Mr. Wise," she said.

The next afternoon Sally herself drove the rec-
tor's horse, and brought Content to pay a call on
little Dan'l.  Sally and Sarah Dean visited in the
sitting-room, and left the little girls alone in the
parlor with a plate of cookies, to get acquainted.
They sat in solemn silence and stared at each other.
Neither spoke. Neither ate a cooky. When Sally
took her leave, she asked little Dan'l if she had had
a nice time with Content, and little Dan'l said,
"Yes, ma'am."

Sarah insisted upon Content's carrying the cookies
home in the dish with a napkin over it.

"When can I go again to see that other little girl?"
asked Content as she and Sally were jogging home.

"Oh, almost any time. I will drive you over --
because it is rather a lonesome walk for you. Did
you like the little girl? She is younger than you."

"Yes'm."

Also little Dan'l inquired of old Daniel when the
other little girl was coming again, and nodded em-
phatically when asked if she had had a nice time.
Evidently both had enjoyed, after the inscrutable
fashion of childhood, their silent session with each
other. Content came generally once a week, and
old Daniel was invited to take little Dan'l to the
rector's. On that occasion Lucy Rose was present,
and Lily Jennings. The four little girls had tea to-
gether at a little table set on the porch, and only
Lily Jennings talked. The rector drove old Daniel
and the child home, and after they had arrived the
child's tongue was loosened and she chattered. She
had seen everything there was to be seen at the rec-
tor's. She told of it in her little silver pipe of a voice.
She had to be checked and put to bed, lest she be
tired out.

"I never knew that child could talk so much," Sarah
said to Daniel, after the little girl had gone up-stairs.

"She talks quite some when she's alone with me."

"And she seems to see everything."

"Ain't much that child don't see," said Daniel,
proudly.

The summer continued unusually hot, but Daniel
never again succumbed. When autumn came, for
the first time in his old life old Daniel Wise was
sorrowful. He dreaded the effect of the frost and
the winter upon his precious little Dan'l, whom he
put before himself as fondly as any father could
have done, and as the season progressed his dread
seemed justified. Poor little Dan'l had cold after
cold. Content Adams and Lucy Rose came to see
her. The rector's wife and the doctor's sent dainties.
But the child coughed and pined, and old Daniel
began to look forward to spring and summer -- the
seasons which had been his bugaboos through life
-- as if they were angels. When the February thaw
came, he told little Dan'l, "Jest look at the snow
meltin' and the drops hangin' on the trees; that is
a sign of summer."

Old Daniel watched for the first green light along
the fences and the meadow hollows. When the trees
began to cast slightly blurred shadows, because of
budding leaves, and the robins hopped over the
terraces, and now and then the air was cleft with
blue wings, he became jubilant. "Spring is jest
about here, and then uncle's little Dan'l will stop
coughin', and run out of doors and pick flowers," he
told the child beside the window.

Spring came that year with a riotous rush. Blos-
soms, leaves, birds, and flowers -- all arrived pell-
mell, fairly smothering the world with sweetness
and music. In May, about the first of the month,
there was an intensely hot day. It was as hot as
midsummer. Old Daniel with little Dan'l went
afield. It was, to both, as if they fairly saw the car-
nival-arrival of flowers, of green garlands upon tree-
branches, of birds and butterflies. "Spring is right
here!" said old Daniel. "Summer is right here!
Pick them vilets in that holler, little Dan'l." The
old man sat on a stone in the meadowland, and
watched the child in the blue-gleaming hollow gather
up violets in her little hands as if they were jewels.
The sun beat upon his head, the air was heavy with
fragrance, laden with moisture. Old Daniel wiped
his forehead. He was heated, but so happy that he
was not aware of it. He saw wonderful new lights
over everything. He had wielded love, the one in-
vincible weapon of the whole earth, and had con-
quered his intangible and dreadful enemy. When,
for the sake of that little beloved life, his own life
had become as nothing, old Daniel found himself
superior to it. He sat there in the tumultuous heat
of the May day, watching the child picking violets
and gathering strength with every breath of the
young air of the year, and he realized that the fear
of his whole life was overcome for ever. He realized
that never again, though they might bring suffering,
even death, would he dread the summers with their
torrid winds and their burning lights, since, through
love, he had become under-lord of all the conditions
of his life upon earth.




BIG SISTER SOLLY





BIG SISTER SOLLY

IT did seem strange that Sally Patterson, who,
according to her own self-estimation, was the
least adapted of any woman in the village, should
have been the one chosen by a theoretically selective
providence to deal with a psychological problem.

It was conceded that little Content Adams was a
psychological problem. She was the orphan child of
very distant relatives of the rector. When her par-
ents died she had been cared for by a widowed aunt
on her mother's side, and this aunt had also borne
the reputation of being a creature apart. When the
aunt died, in a small village in the indefinite "Out
West," the presiding clergyman had notified Edward
Patterson of little Content's lonely and helpless
estate. The aunt had subsisted upon an annuity
which had died with her. The child had inherited
nothing except personal property. The aunt's house
had been bequeathed to the church over which the
clergyman presided, and after her aunt's death he
took her to his own home until she could be sent to
her relatives, and he and his wife were exceedingly
punctilious about every jot and tittle of the aunt's
personal belongings.  They even purchased two
extra trunks for them, which they charged to the
rector.

Little Content, traveling in the care of a lady who
had known her aunt and happened to be coming
East, had six large trunks, besides a hat-box and two
suit-cases and a nailed-up wooden box containing
odds and ends. Content made quite a sensation
when she arrived and her baggage was piled on the
station platform.

Poor Sally Patterson unpacked little Content's
trunks. She had sent the little girl to school within
a few days after her arrival. Lily Jennings and
Amelia Wheeler called for her, and aided her down
the street between them, arms interlocked. Content,
although Sally had done her best with a pretty
ready-made dress and a new hat, was undeniably a
peculiar-looking child. In the first place, she had
an expression so old that it was fairly uncanny.

"That child has downward curves beside her
mouth already, and lines between her eyes, and what
she will look like a few years hence is beyond me,"
Sally told her husband after she had seen the little
girl go out of sight between Lily's curls and ruffles
and ribbons and Amelia's smooth skirts.

"She doesn't look like a happy child," agreed the
rector. "Poor little thing! Her aunt Eudora must
have been a queer woman to train a child."

"She is certainly trained," said Sally, ruefully;
"too much so. Content acts as if she were afraid to
move or speak or even breathe unless somebody
signals permission. I pity her."

She was in the storeroom, in the midst of Con-
tent's baggage. The rector sat on an old chair,
smoking. He had a conviction that it behooved him
as a man to stand by his wife during what might
prove an ordeal. He had known Content's deceased
aunt years before. He had also known the clergyman
who had taken charge of her personal property and
sent it on with Content.

"Be prepared for finding almost anything. Sally,"
he observed. "Mr. Zenock Shanksbury, as I re-
member him, was so conscientious that it amounted
to mania. I am sure he has sent simply unspeakable
things rather than incur the reproach of that con-
science of his with regard to defrauding Content of
one jot or tittle of that personal property."

Sally shook out a long, black silk dress, with jet
dangling here and there. "Now here is this dress,"
said she. "I suppose I really must keep this, but
when that child is grown up the silk will probably
be cracked and entirely worthless."

"You had better take the two trunks and pack
them with such things, and take your chances."

"Oh, I suppose so. I suppose I must take chances
with everything except furs and wools, which will
collect moths. Oh, goodness!" Sally held up an
old-fashioned fitch fur tippet. Little vague winged
things came from it like dust. "Moths!" said she,
tragically. "Moths now. It is full of them. Ed-
ward, you need not tell me that clergyman's wife
was conscientious. No conscientious woman would
have sent an old fur tippet all eaten with moths into
another woman's house. She could not."

Sally took flying leaps across the storeroom. She
flung open the window and tossed out the mangy
tippet. "This is simply awful!" she declared, as she
returned. "Edward, don't you think we are justi-
fied in having Thomas take all these things out in
the back yard and making a bonfire of the whole
lot?"

"No, my dear."

"But, Edward, nobody can tell what will come
next. If Content's aunt had died of a contagious
disease, nothing could induce me to touch another
thing."

"Well, dear, you know that she died from the
shock of a carriage accident, because she had a weak
heart."

"I know it, and of course there is nothing con-
tagious about that." Sally took up an ancient
bandbox and opened it. She displayed its contents:
a very frivolous bonnet dating back in style a half-
century, gay with roses and lace and green strings,
and another with a heavy crape veil dependent.

"You certainly do not advise me to keep these?"
asked Sally, despondently.

Edward Patterson looked puzzled. "Use your
own judgment," he said, finally.

Sally summarily marched across the room and
flung the gay bonnet and the mournful one out of the
window. Then she took out a bundle of very old
underwear which had turned a saffron yellow with
age. "People are always coming to me for old linen
in case of burns," she said, succinctly. "After these
are washed I can supply an auto da fe."

Poor Sally worked all that day and several days
afterward. The rector deserted her, and she relied
upon her own good sense in the disposition of little
Content's legacy. When all was over she told her
husband.

"Well, Edward," said she, "there is exactly one
trunk half full of things which the child may live to
use, but it is highly improbable. We have had six
bonfires, and I have given away three suits of old
clothes to Thomas's father. The clothes were very
large."

"Must have belonged to Eudora's first husband.
He was a stout man," said Edward.

"And I have given two small suits of men's clothes
to the Aid Society for the next out-West barrel."

"Eudora's second husband's."

"And I gave the washerwoman enough old baking-
dishes to last her lifetime, and some cracked dishes.
Most of the dishes were broken, but a few were only
cracked; and I have given Silas Thomas's wife ten
old wool dresses and a shawl and three old cloaks.
All the other things which did not go into the bon-
fires went to the Aid Society. They will go back out
West." Sally laughed, a girlish peal, and her hus-
band joined. But suddenly her smooth forehead
contracted. "Edward," said she.

"Well, dear?"

"I am terribly puzzled about one thing." The
two were sitting in the study. Content had gone to
bed. Nobody could hear easily, but Sally Patterson
lowered her voice, and her honest, clear blue eyes had
a frightened expression.

"What is it, dear?"

"You will think me very silly and cowardly, and
I think I have never been cowardly, but this is really
very strange. Come with me. I am such a goose,
I don't dare go alone to that storeroom."

The rector rose. Sally switched on the lights as
they went up-stairs to the storeroom.

"Tread very softly," she whispered. "Content is
probably asleep."

The two tiptoed up the stairs and entered the
storeroom. Sally approached one of the two new
trunks which had come with Content from out West.
She opened it. She took out a parcel nicely folded
in a large towel.

"See here, Edward Patterson."

The rector stared as Sally shook out a dress --
a gay, up-to-date dress, a young girl's dress, a very
tall young girl's, for the skirts trailed on the floor as
Sally held it as high as she could. It was made of
a fine white muslin. There was white lace on the
bodice, and there were knots of blue ribbon scattered
over the whole, knots of blue ribbon confining tiny
bunches of rosebuds and daisies. These knots of
blue ribbon and the little flowers made it undeniably
a young girl's costume. Even in the days of all ages
wearing the costumes of all ages, an older woman
would have been abashed before those exceedingly
youthful knots of blue ribbons and flowers.

The rector looked approvingly at it. "That is
very pretty, it seems to me," he said. "That must
be worth keeping, Sally."

"Worth keeping! Well, Edward Patterson, just
wait. You are a man, and of course you cannot un-
derstand how very strange it is about the dress."
The rector looked inquiringly.

"I want to know," said Sally, "if Content's aunt
Eudora had any young relative besides Content. I
mean had she a grown-up young girl relative who
would wear a dress like this?"

"I don't know of anybody. There might have
been some relative of Eudora's first husband. No,
he was an only child. I don't think it possible that
Eudora had any young girl relative."

"If she had," said Sally, firmly, "she would have
kept this dress. You are sure there was nobody
else living with Content's aunt at the time she died?"

"Nobody except the servants, and they were an
old man and his wife."

"Then whose dress was this?"

"I don't know, Sally."

"You don't know, and I don't. It is very strange."

"I suppose," said Edward Patterson, helpless be-
fore the feminine problem, "that -- Eudora got it in
some way."

"In some way," repeated Sally. "That is always
a man's way out of a mystery when there is a mys-
tery. There is a mystery. There is a mystery which
worries me. I have not told you all yet, Edward."

"What more is there, dear?"

"I -- asked Content whose dress this was, and
she said -- Oh, Edward, I do so despise mysteries."

"What did she say, Sally?"

"She said it was her big sister Solly's dress."

"Her what?"

"Her big sister Solly's dress. Edward, has Con-
tent ever had a sister? Has she a sister now?"

"No, she never had a sister, and she has none
now," declared the rector, emphatically. "I knew
all her family. What in the world ails the child?"

"She said her big sister Solly, Edward, and the
very name is so inane. If she hasn't any big sister
Solly, what are we going to do?"

"Why, the child must simply lie," said the rector.

"But, Edward, I don't think she knows she lies.
You may laugh, but I think she is quite sure that
she has a big sister Solly, and that this is her dress.
I have not told you the whole. After she came home
from school to-day she went up to her room, and
she left the door open, and pretty soon I heard her
talking. At first I thought perhaps Lily or Amelia
was up there, although I had not seen either of
them come in with Content. Then after a while,
when I had occasion to go up-stairs, I looked in her
room, and she was quite alone, although I had heard
her talking as I went up-stairs. Then I said: 'Con-
tent, I thought somebody was in your room. I
heard you talking.'

"And she said, looking right into my eyes: 'Yes,
ma'am, I was talking.'

"'But there is nobody here,' I said.

"'Yes, ma'am,' she said. 'There isn't anybody
here now, but my big sister Solly was here, and she
is gone. You heard me talking to my big sister
Solly.' I felt faint, Edward, and you know it takes
a good deal to overcome me. I just sat down in
Content's wicker rocking-chair. I looked at her and
she looked at me. Her eyes were just as clear and
blue, and her forehead looked like truth itself. She
is not exactly a pretty child, and she has a peculiar
appearance, but she does certainly look truthful and
good, and she looked so then. She had tried to
fluff her hair over her forehead a little as I had
told her, and not pull it back so tight, and she wore
her new dress, and her face and hands were as clean,
and she stood straight. You know she is a little
inclined to stoop, and I have talked to her about
it. She stood straight, and looked at me with those
blue eyes, and I did feel fairly dizzy."

"What did you say?"

"Well, after a bit I pulled myself together and
I said: 'My dear little girl, what is this? What do
you mean about your big sister Sarah?' Edward,
I could not bring myself to say that idiotic Solly.
In fact, I did think I must be mistaken and had not
heard correctly. But Content just looked at me
as if she thought me very stupid. 'Solly,' said she.
'My sister's name is Solly.'

"'But, my dear,' I said, 'I understand that you
had no sister.'

"'Yes,' said she, 'I have my big sister Solly.'

"'But where has she been all the time?' said I.

"Then Content looked at me and smiled, and it
was quite a wonderful smile, Edward. She smiled
as if she knew so much more than I could ever
know, and quite pitied me."

"She did not answer your question?"

"No, only by that smile which seemed to tell
whole volumes about that awful Solly's whereabouts,
only I was too ignorant to read them.

"'Where is she now, dear?' I said, after a little.

"'She is gone now,' said Content.

"'Gone where?' said I.

"And then the child smiled at me again. Edward,
what are we going to do? Is she untruthful, or has
she too much imagination? I have heard of such a
thing as too much imagination, and children telling
lies which were not really lies."

"So have I," agreed the rector, dryly, "but I
never believed in it." The rector started to leave
the room.

"What are you going to do?" inquired Sally.

"I am going to endeavor to discriminate between
lies and imagination," replied the rector.

Sally plucked at his coat-sleeve as they went
down-stairs. "My dear," she whispered, "I think
she is asleep."

"She will have to wake up."

"But, my dear, she may be nervous. Would
it not be better to wait until to-morrow?"

"I think not," said Edward Patterson. Usually
an easy-going man, when he was aroused he was
determined to extremes. Into Content's room he
marched, Sally following.   Neither of them saw
their small son Jim peeking around his door. He
had heard -- he could not help it -- the conversation
earlier in the day between Content and his mother.
He had also heard other things. He now felt entirely
justified in listening, although he had a good code
of honor. He considered himself in a way respon-
sible, knowing what he knew, for the peace of
mind of his parents. Therefore he listened, peeking
around the doorway of his dark room.

The electric light flashed out from Content's
room, and the little interior was revealed. It was
charmingly pretty. Sally had done her best to make
this not altogether welcome little stranger's room
attractive. There were garlands of rosebuds swung
from the top of the white satin-papered walls.
There were dainty toilet things, a little dressing-
table decked with ivory, a case of books, chairs
cushioned with rosebud chintz, windows curtained
with the same.

In the little white bed, with a rose-sprinkled cover-
lid over her, lay Content. She was not asleep.
Directly, when the light flashed out, she looked at
the rector and his wife with her clear blue eyes. Her
fair hair, braided neatly and tied with pink ribbons,
lay in two tails on either side of her small, certainly
very good face. Her forehead was beautiful, very
white and full, giving her an expression of candor
which was even noble. Content, little lonely girl
among strangers in a strange place, mutely beseech-
ing love and pity, from her whole attitude toward
life and the world, looked up at Edward Patterson
and Sally, and the rector realized that his determina-
tion was giving way. He began to believe in imagi-
nation, even to the extent of a sister Solly. He had
never had a daughter, and sometimes the thought
of one had made his heart tender. His voice was
very kind when he spoke.

"Well, little girl," he said, "what is this I hear?"

Sally stared at her husband and stifled a chuckle.

As for Content, she looked at the rector and said
nothing. It was obvious that she did not know
what he had heard. The rector explained.

"My dear little girl," he said, "your aunt Sally"
-- they had agreed upon the relationship of uncle and
aunt to Content -- "tells me that you have been
telling her about your -- big sister Solly." The rector
half gasped as he said Solly. He seemed to himself
to be on the driveling verge of idiocy before the pro-
nunciation of that absurdly inane name.

Content's responding voice came from the pink-
and-white nest in which she was snuggled, like the
fluting pipe of a canary.

"Yes, sir," said she.

"My dear child," said the rector, "you know
perfectly well that you have no big sister -- Solly."
Every time the rector said Solly he swallowed hard.

Content smiled as Sally had described her smiling.
She said nothing.  The rector felt reproved and
looked down upon from enormous heights of inno-
cence and childhood and the wisdom thereof. How-
ever, he persisted.

"Content," he said, "what did you mean by
telling your aunt Sally what you did?"

"I was talking with my big sister Solly," replied
Content, with the calmness of one stating a funda-
mental truth of nature.

The rector's face grew stern. "Content," he said,
"look at me."

Content looked. Looking seemed to be the in-
stinctive action which distinguished her as an indi-
vidual.

"Have you a big sister -- Solly?" asked the rector.
His face was stern, but his voice faltered.

"Yes, sir."

"Then -- tell me so."

"I have a big sister Solly," said Content. Now
she spoke rather wearily, although still sweetly, as
if puzzled why she had been disturbed in sleep to
be asked such an obvious question.

"Where has she been all the time, that we have
known nothing about her?" demanded the rector.

Content smiled. However, she spoke. "Home,"
said she.

"When did she come here?"

"This morning."

"Where is she now?"

Content smiled and was silent. The rector cast
a helpless look at his wife. He now did not care
if she did see that he was completely at a loss.
How could a great, robust man and a clergyman
be harsh to a tender little girl child in a pink-and-
white nest of innocent dreams?

Sally pitied him. She spoke more harshly than
her husband. "Content Adams," said she, "you
know perfectly well that you have no big sister
Solly. Now tell me the truth. Tell me you have
no big sister Solly."

"I have a big sister Solly," said Content.

"Come, Edward," said Sally. "There is no use
in staying and talking to this obstinate little girl
any longer." Then she spoke to Content. "Before
you go to sleep," said she, "you must say your
prayers, if you have not already done so."

"I have said my prayers," replied Content, and
her blue eyes were full of horrified astonishment at
the suspicion.

"Then," said Sally, "you had better say them
over and add something. Pray that you may always
tell the truth."

"Yes, ma'am," said Content, in her little canary
pipe.

The rector and his wife went out. Sally switched
off the light with a snap as she passed. Out in the
hall she stopped and held her husband's arms hard.
"Hush!" she whispered. They both listened. They
heard this, in the faintest plaint of a voice:

"They don't believe you are here, Sister Solly,
but I do."

Sally dashed back into the rosebud room and
switched on the light. She stared around. She
opened a closet door. Then she turned off the light
and joined her husband.

"There was nobody there?" he whispered.

"Of course not."

When they were back in the study the rector
and his wife looked at each other.

"We will do the best we can," said Sally. "Don't
worry, Edward, for you have to write your sermon
to-morrow. We will manage some way. I will admit
that I rather wish Content had had some other
distant relative besides you who could have taken
charge of her."

"You poor child!" said the rector. "It is hard
on you, Sally, for she is no kith nor kin of yours."

"Indeed I don't mind," said Sally Patterson, "if
only I can succeed in bringing her up."

Meantime Jim Patterson, up-stairs, sitting over
his next day's algebra lesson, was even more per-
plexed than were his parents in the study. He paid
little attention to his book. "I can manage little
Lucy," he reflected, "but if the others have got hold
of it, I don't know."

Presently he rose and stole very softly through
the hall to Content's door. She was timid, and
always left it open so she could see the hall light
until she fell asleep. "Content," whispered Jim.

There came the faintest "What?" in response.

"Don't you," said Jim, in a theatrical whisper,
"say another word at school to anybody about your
big sister Solly. If you do, I'll whop you, if you
are a girl."

"Don't care!" was sighed forth from the room.

"And I'll whop your old big sister Solly, too."

There was a tiny sob.

"I will," declared Jim. "Now you mind!"

The next day Jim cornered little Lucy Rose under
a cedar-tree before school began. He paid no atten-
tion to Bubby Harvey and Tom Simmons, who were
openly sniggering at him. Little Lucy gazed up
at Jim, and the blue-green shade of the cedar seemed
to bring out only more clearly the white-rose softness
of her dear little face. Jim bent over her.

"Want you to do something for me," he whis-
pered.

Little Lucy nodded gravely.

"If my new cousin Content ever says anything
to you again -- I heard her yesterday -- about her
big sister Solly, don't you ever say a word about it
to anybody else. You will promise me, won't you,
little Lucy?"

A troubled expression came into little Lucy's kind
eyes. "But she told Lily, and Lily told Amelia, and
Amelia told her grandmother Wheeler, and her
grandmother Wheeler told Miss Parmalee when she
met her on the street after school, and Miss Parma-
lee called on my aunt Martha and told her," said
little Lucy.

"Oh, shucks!" said Jim.

"And my aunt Martha told my father that she
thought perhaps she ought to ask for her when she
called on your mother. She said Arnold Carruth's
aunt Flora was going to call, and his aunt Dorothy.
I heard Miss Acton tell Miss Parmalee that she
thought they ought to ask for her when they called
on your mother, too."

"Little Lucy," he said, and lowered his voice,
"you must promise me never, as long as you live,
to tell what I am going to tell you."

Little Lucy looked frightened.

"Promise!" insisted Jim.

"I promise," said little Lucy, in a weak voice.

"Never, as long as you live, to tell anybody.
Promise!"

"I promise."

"Now, you know if you break your promise and
tell, you will be guilty of a dreadful lie and be very
wicked."

Little Lucy shivered. "I never will."

"Well, my new cousin Content Adams -- tells lies."

Little Lucy gasped.

"Yes, she does. She says she has a big sister
Solly, and she hasn't got any big sister Solly. She
never did have, and she never will have. She makes
believe."

"Makes believe?" said little Lucy, in a hopeful
voice.

"Making believe is just a real mean way of lying.
Now I made Content promise last night never to
say one word in school about her big sister Solly, and
I am going to tell you this, so you can tell Lily and
the others and not lie. Of course, I don't want to
lie myself, because my father is rector, and, besides,
mother doesn't approve of it; but if anybody is
going to lie, I am the one. Now, you mind, little
Lucy. Content's big sister Solly has gone away,
and she is never coming back. If you tell Lily and
the others I said so, I can't see how you will be lying."

Little Lucy gazed at the boy. She looked like
truth incarnate. "But," said she, in her adorable
stupidity of innocence, "I don't see how she could
go away if she was never here, Jim."

"Oh, of course she couldn't. But all you have to
do is to say that you heard me say she had gone.
Don't you understand?"

"I don't understand how Content's big sister Solly
could possibly go away if she was never here."

"Little Lucy, I wouldn't ask you to tell a lie for
the world, but if you were just to say that you heard
me say --"

"I think it would be a lie," said little Lucy, "be-
cause how can I help knowing if she was never here
she couldn't --"

"Oh, well, little Lucy," cried Jim, in despair, still
with tenderness -- how could he be anything but
tender with little Lucy? -- "all I ask is never to say
anything about it."

"If they ask me?"

"Anyway, you can hold your tongue. You know
it isn't wicked to hold your tongue."

Little Lucy absurdly stuck out the pointed tip of
her little red tongue. Then she shook her head
slowly.

"Well," she said, "I will hold my tongue."

This encounter with innocence and logic had left
him worsted. Jim could see no way out of the fact
that his father, the rector, his mother, the rector's
wife, and he, the rector's son, were disgraced by
their relationship to such an unsanctified little soul
as this queer Content Adams.

And yet he looked at the poor lonely little girl, who
was trying very hard to learn her lessons, who sug-
gested in her very pose and movement a little, scared
rabbit ready to leap the road for some bush of hiding,
and while he was angry with her he pitied her. He
had no doubts concerning Content's keeping her
promise. He was quite sure that he would now say
nothing whatever about that big sister Solly to the
others, but he was not prepared for what happened
that very afternoon.

When he went home from school his heart stood
still to see Miss Martha Rose, and Arnold Carruth's
aunt Flora, and his aunt who was not his aunt, Miss
Dorothy Vernon, who was visiting her, all walking
along in state with their lace-trimmed parasols,
their white gloves, and their nice card-cases. Jim
jumped a fence and raced across lots home, and
gained on them. He burst in on his mother, sitting
on the porch, which was inclosed by wire netting
overgrown with a budding vine. It was the first
warm day of the season.

"Mother," cried Jim Patterson -- "mother, they
are coming!"

"Who, for goodness' sake, Jim?"

"Why, Arnold's aunt Flora and his aunt Dorothy
and little Lucy's aunt Martha. They are coming to
call."

Involuntarily Sally's hand went up to smooth her
pretty hair. "Well, what of it, Jim?" said she.

"Mother, they will ask for -- big sister Solly!"

Sally Patterson turned pale.  "How do you
know?"

"Mother, Content has been talking at school. A
lot know. You will see they will ask for --"

"Run right in and tell Content to stay in her
room," whispered Sally, hastily, for the callers,
their white-kidded hands holding their card-cases
genteelly, were coming up the walk.

Sally advanced, smiling.  She put a brave face
on the matter, but she realized that she, Sally
Patterson, who had never been a coward, was
positively afraid before this absurdity. The callers
sat with her on the pleasant porch, with the young
vine-shadows making networks over their best gowns.
Tea was served presently by the maid, and, much to
Sally's relief, before the maid appeared came the
inquiry. Miss Martha Rose made it.

"We would be pleased to see Miss Solly Adams
also," said Miss Martha.

Flora Carruth echoed her. "I was so glad to hear
another nice girl had come to the village," said she
with enthusiasm. Miss Dorothy Vernon said some-
thing indefinite to the same effect.

"I am sorry," replied Sally, with an effort, "but
there is no Miss Solly Adams here now." She spoke
the truth as nearly as she could manage without
unraveling the whole ridiculous affair. The callers
sighed with regret, tea was served with little cakes,
and they fluttered down the walk, holding their card-
cases, and that ordeal was over.

But Sally sought the rector in his study, and she
was trembling. "Edward," she cried out, regardless
of her husband's sermon, "something must be done
now."

"Why, what is the matter, Sally?"

"People are -- calling on her."

"Calling on whom?"

"Big sister -- Solly!" Sally explained.

"Well, don't worry, dear," said the rector. "Of
course we will do something, but we must think it
over. Where is the child now?"

"She and Jim are out in the garden. I saw them
pass the window just now. Jim is such a dear boy,
he tries hard to be nice to her. Edward Patterson,
we ought not to wait."

"My dear, we must."

Meantime Jim and Content Adams were out in
the garden. Jim had gone to Content's door and
tapped and called out, rather rudely: "Content, I
say, put on your hat and come along out in the
garden. I've got something to tell you."

"Don't want to," protested Content's little voice,
faintly.

"You come right along."

And Content came along. She was an obedient
child, and she liked Jim, although she stood much
in awe of him. She followed him into the garden
back of the rectory, and they sat down on the bench
beneath the weeping willow. The minute they were
seated Jim began to talk.

"Now," said he, "I want to know."

Content glanced up at him, then looked down
and turned pale.

"I want to know, honest Injun," said Jim, "what
you are telling such awful whoppers about your old
big sister Solly for?"

Content was silent. This time she did not smile,
a tear trickled out of her right eye and ran over the
pale cheek.

"Because you know," said Jim, observant of the
tear, but ruthless, "that you haven't any big sister
Solly, and never did have. You are getting us all
in an awful mess over it, and father is rector
here, and mother is his wife, and I am his
son, and you are his niece, and it is downright
mean. Why do you tell such whoppers? Out
with it!"

Content was trembling violently. "I lived with
Aunt Eudora," she whispered.

"Well, what of that? Other folks have lived
with their aunts and not told whoppers."

"They haven't lived with Aunt Eudora."

"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Content
Adams, and you the rector's niece, talking that way
about dead folks."

"I don't mean to talk about poor Aunt Eudora,"
fairly sobbed Content. "Aunt Eudora was a real
good aunt, but she was grown up. She was a good
deal more grown up than your mother; she really
was, and when I first went to live with her I was
'most a little baby; I couldn't speak -- plain, and
I had to go to bed real early, and slept 'way off from
everybody, and I used to be afraid -- all alone, and
so --"

"Well, go on," said Jim, but his voice was softer.
It WAS hard lines for a little kid, especially if she
was a girl.

"And so," went on the little, plaintive voice, "I
got to thinking how nice it would be if I only had
a big sister, and I used to cry and say to myself -- I
couldn't speak plain, you know, I was so little --
'Big sister would be real solly.' And then first
thing I knew -- she came."

"Who came?"

"Big sister Solly."

"What rot! She didn't come. Content Adams,
you know she didn't come."

"She must have come," persisted the little girl,
in a frightened whisper. "She must have. Oh, Jim,
you don't know. Big sister Solly must have come,
or I would have died like my father and mother."

Jim's arm, which was near her, twitched convul-
sively, but he did not put it around her.

"She did -- co-me," sobbed Content. "Big sister
Solly did come."

"Well, have it so," said Jim, suddenly. "No use
going over that any longer. Have it she came, but
she ain't here now, anyway. Content Adams, you
can't look me in the face and tell me that."

Content looked at Jim, and her little face was
almost terrible, so full of bewilderment and fear
it was. "Jim," whispered Content, "I can't have
big sister Solly not be here. I can't send her away.
What would she think?"

Jim stared. "Think? Why, she isn't alive to
think, anyhow!"

"I can't make her -- dead," sobbed Content. "She
came when I wanted her, and now when I don't so
much, when I've got Uncle Edward and Aunt Sally
and you, and don't feel so dreadful lonesome, I
can't be so bad as to make her dead."

Jim whistled. Then his face brightened up. He
looked at Content with a shrewd and cheerful grin.
"See here, kid, you say your sister Solly is big,
grown up, don't you?" he inquired.

Content nodded pitifully.

"Then why, if she is grown up and pretty, don't
she have a beau?"

Content stopped sobbing and gave him a quick
glance.

"Then -- why doesn't she get married, and go out
West to live?"

Jim chuckled. Instead of a sob, a faint echo of his
chuckle came from Content.

Jim laughed merrily. "I say, Content," he cried,
"let's have it she's married now, and gone?"

"Well," said Content.

Jim put his arm around her very nicely and pro-
tectingly. "It's all right, then," said he, "as all
right as it can be for a girl. Say, Content, ain't it
a shame you aren't a boy?"

"I can't help it," said Content, meekly.

"You see," said Jim, thoughtfully, "I don't, as
a rule, care much about girls, but if you could coast
down-hill and skate, and do a few things like that,
you would be almost as good as a boy."

Content surveyed him, and her pessimistic little
face assumed upward curves. "I will," said she.
"I will do anything, Jim. I will fight if you want
me to, just like a boy."

"I don't believe you could lick any of us fellers
unless you get a good deal harder in the muscles,"
said Jim, eying her thoughtfully; "but we'll play
ball, and maybe by and by you can begin with
Arnold Carruth."

"Could lick him now," said Content.

But Jim's face sobered before her readiness. "Oh
no, you mustn't go to fighting right away," said he.
"It wouldn't do. You really are a girl, you know,
and father is rector."

"Then I won't," said Content; "but I COULD knock
down that little boy with curls; I know I could."

"Well, you needn't. I'll like you just as well.
You see, Content" -- Jim's voice faltered, for he was
a boy, and on the verge of sentiment before which
he was shamed -- "you see, Content, now your big
sister Solly is married and gone out West, why, you
can have me for your brother, and of course a
brother is a good deal better than a sister."

"Yes," said Content, eagerly.

"I am going," said Jim, "to marry Lucy Rose
when I grow up, but I haven't got any sister, and
I'd like you first rate for one. So I'll be your big
brother instead of your cousin."

"Big brother Solly?"

"Say, Content, that is an awful name, but I don't
care. You're only a girl. You can call me any-
thing you want to, but you mustn't call me Solly
when there is anybody within hearing."

"I won't."

"Because it wouldn't do," said Jim with weight.

"I never will, honest," said Content.

Presently they went into the house. Dr. Trum-
bull was there; he had been talking seriously to the
rector and his wife. He had come over on purpose.

"It is a perfect absurdity," he said, "but I made
ten calls this morning, and everywhere I was asked
about that little Adams girl's big sister -- why you
keep her hidden. They have a theory that she is
either an idiot or dreadfully disfigured. I had to
tell them I know nothing about it."

"There isn't any girl," said the rector, wearily.
"Sally, do explain."

Dr. Trumbull listened. "I have known such
cases," he said when Sally had finished.

"What did you do for them?" Sally asked, anx-
iously.

"Nothing. Such cases have to be cured by time.
Children get over these fancies when they grow up."

"Do you mean to say that we have to put up with
big sister Solly until Content is grown up?" asked
Sally, in a desperate tone. And then Jim came in.
Content had run up-stairs.

"It is all right, mother," said Jim.

Sally caught him by the shoulders.  "Oh, Jim,
has she told you?"

Jim gave briefly, and with many omissions, an
account of his conversation with Content.

"Did she say anything about that dress, Jim?"
asked his mother.

"She said her aunt had meant it for that out-
West rector's daughter Alice to graduate in, but
Content wanted it for her big sister Solly, and told
the rector's wife it was hers. Content says she knows
she was a naughty girl, but after she had said it she
was afraid to say it wasn't so. Mother, I think that
poor little thing is scared 'most to death."

"Nobody is going to hurt her," said Sally.
"Goodness! that rector's wife was so conscientious
that she even let that dress go. Well, I can send it
right back, and the girl will have it in time for her
graduation, after all. Jim dear, call the poor child
down. Tell her nobody is going to scold her."
Sally's voice was very tender.

Jim returned with Content. She had on a little
ruffled pink gown which seemed to reflect color on
her cheeks. She wore an inscrutable expression, at
once child-like and charming. She looked shy, fur-
tively amused, yet happy. Sally realized that the
pessimistic downward lines had disappeared, that
Content was really a pretty little girl.

Sally put an arm around the small, pink figure.
"So you and Jim have been talking, dear?" she said.

"Yes, ma'am," replied little Content. "Jim is
my big brother --" She just caught herself before
she said Solly.

"And your sister Solly is married and living out
West?"

"Yes," said Content, with a long breath. "My
sister Solly is married." Smiles broke all over her
little face. She hid it in Sally's skirts, and a little
peal of laughter like a bird-trill came from the soft
muslin folds.





LITTLE LUCY ROSE





LITTLE LUCY ROSE

BACK of the rectory there was a splendid, long
hill.  The ground receded until the rectory
garden was reached, and the hill was guarded on
either flank by a thick growth of pines and cedars,
and, being a part of the land appertaining to the
rectory, was never invaded by the village children.
This was considered very fortunate by Mrs. Patterson,
Jim's mother, and for an odd reason. The rector's
wife was very fond of coasting, as she was of most
out-of-door sports, but her dignified position pre-
vented her from enjoying them to the utmost. In
many localities the clergyman's wife might have
played golf and tennis, have rode and swum and
coasted and skated, and nobody thought the worse
of her; but in The Village it was different.

Sally had therefore rejoiced at the discovery of
that splendid, isolated hill behind the house. It
could not have been improved upon for a long, per-
fectly glorious coast, winding up on the pool of ice
in the garden and bumping thrillingly between dry
vegetables. Mrs. Patterson steered and Jim made the
running pushes, and slid flat on his chest behind
his mother. Jim was very proud of his mother. He
often wished that he felt at liberty to tell of her
feats. He had never been told not to tell, but real-
ized, being rather a sharp boy, that silence was
wiser. Jim's mother confided in him, and he re-
spected her confidence. "Oh, Jim dear," she would
often say, "there is a mothers' meeting this after-
noon, and I would so much rather go coasting with
you." Or, "There's a Guild meeting about a fair,
and the ice in the garden is really quite smooth."

It was perhaps unbecoming a rector's wife, but
Jim loved his mother better because she expressed a
preference for the sports he loved, and considered that
no other boy had a mother who was quite equal to
his. Sally Patterson was small and wiry, with a bright
face, and very thick, brown hair, which had a boyish
crest over her forehead, and she could run as fast
as Jim. Jim's father was much older than his mother,
and very dignified, although he had a keen sense of
humor. He used to laugh when his wife and son
came in after their coasting expeditions.

"Well, boys," he would say, "had a good time?"

Jim was perfectly satisfied and convinced that his
mother was the very best and most beautiful per-
son in the village, even in the whole world, until
Mr. Cyril Rose came to fill a vacancy of cashier in
the bank, and his daughter, little Lucy Rose, as
a matter of course, came with him. Little Lucy
had no mother. Mr. Cyril's cousin, Martha Rose,
kept his house, and there was a colored maid with a
bad temper, who was said, however, to be inval-
uable "help."

Little Lucy attended Madame's school.  She
came the next Monday after Jim and his friends had
planned to have a chicken roast and failed. After
Jim saw little Lucy he thought no more of the
chicken roast. It seemed to him that he thought
no more of anything. He could not by any possi-
bility have learned his lessons had it not been for
the desire to appear a good scholar before little Lucy.
Jim had never been a self-conscious boy, but that
day he was so keenly worried about her opinion of
him that his usual easy swing broke into a strut
when he crossed the room. He need not have been
so troubled, because little Lucy was not looking at
him. She was not looking at any boy or girl. She
was only trying to learn her lesson. Little Lucy was
that rather rare creature, a very gentle, obedient
child, with a single eye for her duty. She was so
charming that it was sad to think how much her
mother had missed, as far as this world was con-
cerned.

The minute Madame saw her a singular light
came into her eyes -- the light of love of a childless
woman for a child. Similar lights were in the eyes
of Miss Parmalee and Miss Acton. They looked
at one another with a sort of sweet confidence when
they were drinking tea together after school in Ma-
dame's study.

"Did you ever see such a darling?" said Madame.
Miss Parmalee said she never had, and Miss Acton
echoed her.

"She is a little angel," said Madame.

"She worked so hard over her geography lesson,"
said Miss Parmalee, "and she got the Amazon River
in New England and the Connecticut in South
America, after all; but she was so sweet about it,
she made me want to change the map of the world.
Dear little soul, it did seem as if she ought to have
rivers and everything else just where she chose."

"And she tried so hard to reach an octave, and her
little finger is too short," said Miss Acton; "and she
hasn't a bit of an ear for music, but her little voice
is so sweet it does not matter."

"I have seen prettier children," said Madame,
"but never one quite such a darling."

Miss Parmalee and Miss Acton agreed with Ma-
dame, and so did everybody else. Lily Jennings's
beauty was quite eclipsed by little Lucy, but Lily
did not care; she was herself one of little Lucy's
most fervent admirers. She was really Jim Patter-
son's most formidable rival in the school. "You
don't care about great, horrid boys, do you, dear?"
Lily said to Lucy, entirely within hearing of Jim
and Lee Westminster and Johnny Trumbull and
Arnold Carruth and Bubby Harvey and Frank Ellis,
and a number of others who glowered at her.

Dear little Lucy hesitated. She did not wish to
hurt the feelings of boys, and the question had been
loudly put. Finally she said she didn't know. Lack
of definite knowledge was little Lucy's rock of refuge
in time of need. She would look adorable, and say
in her timid little fluty voice, "I don't -- know."
The last word came always with a sort of gasp which
was alluring. All the listening boys were convinced
that little Lucy loved them all individually and gen-
erally, because of her "I don't -- know."

Everybody was convinced of little Lucy's affec-
tion for everybody, which was one reason for her
charm. She flattered without knowing that she did
so. It was impossible for her to look at any living
thing except with soft eyes of love. It was impos-
sible for her to speak without every tone conveying
the sweetest deference and admiration. The whole
atmosphere of Madame's school changed with the
advent of the little girl. Everybody tried to live
up to little Lucy's supposed ideal, but in reality
she had no ideal. Lucy was the simplest of little
girls, only intent upon being good, doing as she was
told, and winning her father's approval, also her
cousin Martha's.

Martha Rose was quite elderly, although still
good-looking. She was not popular, because she
was very silent. She dressed becomingly, received
calls and returned them, but hardly spoke a word.
People rather dreaded her coming. Miss Martha
Rose would sit composedly in a proffered chair, her
gloved hands crossed over her nice, gold-bound card-
case, her chin tilted at an angle which never varied,
her mouth in a set smile which never wavered, her
slender feet in their best shoes toeing out precisely
under the smooth sweep of her gray silk skirt. Miss
Martha Rose dressed always in gray, a fashion
which the village people grudgingly admired. It
was undoubtedly becoming and distinguished, but
savored ever so slightly of ostentation, as did her
custom of always dressing little Lucy in blue. There
were different shades and fabrics, but blue it always
was. It was the best color for the child, as it re-
vealed the fact that her big, dark eyes were blue.
Shaded as they were by heavy, curly lashes, they
would have been called black or brown, but the blue
in them leaped to vision above the blue of blue
frocks. Little Lucy had the finest, most delicate
features, a mist of soft, dark hair, which curled
slightly, as mist curls, over sweet, round temples.
She was a small, daintily clad child, and she spoke
and moved daintily and softly; and when her blue
eyes were fixed upon anybody's face, that person
straightway saw love and obedience and trust in
them, and love met love half-way. Even Miss
Martha Rose looked another woman when little
Lucy's innocent blue eyes were fixed upon her rather
handsome but colorless face between the folds of
her silvery hair; Miss Martha's hair had turned
prematurely gray. Light would come into Martha
Rose's face, light and animation, although she never
talked much even to Lucy. She never talked much
to her cousin Cyril, but he was rather glad of it.
He had a keen mind, but it was easily diverted, and
he was engrossed in his business, and concerned lest
he be disturbed by such things as feminine chatter,
of which he certainly had none in his own home, if
he kept aloof from Jenny, the colored maid. Hers
was the only female voice ever heard to the point
of annoyance in the Rose house.

It was rather wonderful how a child like little
Lucy and Miss Martha lived with so little conversa-
tion. Martha talked no more at home than abroad;
moreover, at home she had not the attitude of wait-
ing for some one to talk to her, which people outside
considered trying. Martha did not expect her cousin
to talk to her. She seldom asked a question. She
almost never volunteered a perfectly useless obser-
vation. She made no remarks upon self-evident
topics. If the sun shone, she never mentioned it.
If there was a heavy rain, she never mentioned that.
Miss Martha suited her cousin exactly, and for that
reason, aside from the fact that he had been devoted
to little Lucy's mother, it never occurred to him to
marry again. Little Lucy talked no more than Miss
Martha, and nobody dreamed that she sometimes
wanted somebody to talk to her. Nobody dreamed
that the dear little girl, studying her lessons, learn-
ing needlework, trying very futilely to play the
piano, was lonely; but she was without knowing
it herself. Martha was so kind and so still; and her
father was so kind and so still, engrossed in his papers
or books, often sitting by himself in his own study.
Little Lucy in this peace and stillness was not hav-
ing her share of childhood. When other little girls
came to play with her. Miss Martha enjoined quiet,
and even Lily Jennings's bird-like chattering be-
came subdued. It was only at school that Lucy
got her chance for the irresponsible delight which
was the simple right of her childhood, and there her
zeal for her lessons prevented. She was happy at
school, however, for there she lived in an atmos-
phere of demonstrative affection. The teachers
were given to seizing her in fond arms and caress-
ing her, and so were her girl companions; while
the boys, especially Jim Patterson, looked wistful-
ly on.

Jim Patterson was in love, a charming little poetical
boy-love; but it was love. Everything which he
did in those days was with the thought of little
Lucy for incentive. He stood better in school than
he had ever done before, but it was all for the sake
of little Lucy. Jim Patterson had one talent, rather
rudimentary, still a talent. He could play by ear.
His father owned an old violin. He had been in-
clined to music in early youth, and Jim got per-
mission to practise on it, and he went by himself
in the hot attic and practised. Jim's mother did
not care for music, and her son's preliminary scra-
ping tortured her. Jim tucked the old fiddle under
one round boy-cheek and played in the hot attic,
with wasps buzzing around him; and he spent his
pennies for catgut, and he learned to mend fiddle-
strings; and finally came a proud Wednesday after-
noon when there were visitors in Madame's school,
and he stood on the platform, with Miss Acton
playing an accompaniment on the baby grand piano,
and he managed a feeble but true tune on his violin.
It was all for little Lucy, but little Lucy cared no
more for music than his mother; and while Jim was
playing she was rehearsing in the depths of her mind
the little poem which later she was to recite; for
this adorable little Lucy was, as a matter of course,
to figure in the entertainment. It therefore happened
that she heard not one note of Jim Patterson's pain-
fully executed piece, for she was saying to herself
in mental singsong a foolish little poem, beginning:

        There was one little flower that bloomed
           Beside a cottage door.

When she went forward, little darling blue-clad
figure, there was a murmur of admiration; and when
she made mistakes straight through the poem, saying,

        There was a little flower that fell
           On my aunt Martha's floor,

for beginning, there was a roar of tender laughter
and a clapping of tender, maternal hands, and every-
body wanted to catch hold of little Lucy and kiss her.
It was one of the irresistible charms of this child
that people loved her the more for her mistakes,
and she made many, although she tried so very
hard to avoid them. Little Lucy was not in the
least brilliant, but she held love like a precious vase,
and it gave out perfume better than mere knowledge.

Jim Patterson was so deeply in love with her when
he went home that night that he confessed to his
mother. Mrs. Patterson had led up to the subject
by alluding to little Lucy while at the dinner-table.

"Edward," she said to her husband -- both she
and the rector had been present at Madame's school
entertainment and the tea-drinking afterward -- "did
you ever see in all your life such a darling little girl
as the new cashier's daughter? She quite makes up
for Miss Martha, who sat here one solid hour, hold-
ing her card-case, waiting for me to talk to her.
That child is simply delicious, and I was so glad
she made mistakes."

"Yes, she is a charming child," assented the rector,
"despite the fact that she is not a beauty, hardly
even pretty."

"I know it," said Mrs. Patterson, "but she has the
worth of beauty."

Jim was quite pale while his father and mother
were talking. He swallowed the hot soup so fast
that it burnt his tongue. Then he turned very
red, but nobody noticed him. When his mother
came up-stairs to kiss him good night he told her.

"Mother," said he, "I have something to tell
you."

"All right, Jim," replied Sally Patterson, with her
boyish air.

"It is very important," said Jim.

Mrs. Patterson did not laugh; she did not even
smile. She sat down beside Jim's bed and looked
seriously at his eager, rapt, shamed little boy-face
on the pillow. "Well?" said she, after a minute
which seemed difficult to him.

Jim coughed. Then he spoke with a blurt.
"Mother," said Jim, "by and by, of course not quite
yet, but by and by, will you have any objection to
Miss Lucy Rose as a daughter?"

Even then Sally Patterson did not laugh or even
smile. "Are you thinking of marrying her, Jim?"
asked she, quite as if her son had been a man.

"Yes, mother," replied Jim. Then he flung up
his little arms in pink pajama sleeves, and Sally
Patterson took his face between her two hands and
kissed him warmly.

"She is a darling, and your choice does you credit,
Jim," said she. "Of course you have said nothing
to her yet?"

"I thought it was rather too soon."

"I really think you are very wise, Jim," said his
mother.  "It is too soon to put such ideas into
the poor child's head. She is younger than you,
isn't she, Jim?"

"She is just six months and three days younger,"
replied Jim, with majesty.

"I thought so. Well, you know, Jim, it would
just wear her all out, as young as that, to be obliged
to think about her trousseau and housekeeping and
going to school, too."

"I know it," said Jim, with a pleased air. "I
thought I was right, mother."

"Entirely right; and you, too, really ought to
finish school, and take up a profession or a busi-
ness, before you say anything definite. You would
want a nice home for the dear little thing, you
know that, Jim."

Jim stared at his mother out of his white pillow.
"I thought I would stay with you, and she would
stay with her father until we were both very much
older," said he. "She has a nice home now, you
know, mother."

Sally Patterson's mouth twitched a little, but she
spoke quite gravely and reasonably. "Yes, that is
very true," said she; "still, I do think you are wise
to wait, Jim."

When Sally Patterson had left Jim, she looked in
on the rector in his study. "Our son is thinking
seriously of marrying, Edward," said she.

The rector stared at her. She had shut the door,
and she laughed.

"He is very discreet. He has consulted me as to
my approval of her as daughter and announced his
intention to wait a little while."

The rector laughed; then he wrinkled his forehead
uneasily. "I don't like the little chap getting such
ideas," said he.

"Don't worry, Edward; he hasn't got them,"
said Sally Patterson.

"I hope not."

"He has made a very wise choice. She is that
perfect darling of a Rose girl who couldn't speak
her piece, and thought we all loved her when we
laughed."

"Well, don't let him get foolish ideas; that is all,
my dear," said the rector.

"Don't worry, Edward. I can manage him,"
said Sally.

But she was mistaken. The very next day Jim
proposed in due form to little Lucy. He could not
help it. It was during the morning intermission,
and he came upon her seated all alone under a haw-
thorn hedge, studying her arithmetic anxiously.
She was in blue, as usual, and a very perky blue bow
sat on her soft, dark hair, like a bluebird. She
glanced up at Jim from under her long lashes.

"Do two and seven make eight or ten? If you
please, will you tell me?" said she.

"Say, Lucy," said Jim, "will you marry me by
and by?"

Lucy stared at him uncomprehendingly.

"Will you?"

"Will I what?"

"Marry me by and by?"

Lucy took refuge in her little harbor of ignorance.
"I don't know," said she.

"But you like me, don't you, Lucy?"

"I don't know."

"Don't you like me better than you like Johnny
Trumbull?"

"I don't know."

"You like me better than you like Arnold Carruth,
don't you? He has curls and wears socks."

"I don't know."

"When do you think you can be sure?"

"I don't know."

Jim stared helplessly at little Lucy. She stared
back sweetly.

"Please tell me whether two and seven make
six or eleven, Jim," said she.

"They make nine," said Jim.

"I have been counting my fingers and I got it
eleven, but I suppose I must have counted one finger
twice," said little Lucy. She gazed reflectively at
her little baby-hands. A tiny ring with a blue stone
shone on one finger.

"I will give you a ring, you know," Jim said,
coaxingly.

"I have got a ring my father gave me. Did you
say it was ten, please, Jim?"

"Nine," gasped Jim.

"All the way I can remember," said little Lucy,
"is for you to pick just so many leaves off the hedge,
and I will tie them in my handkerchief, and just be-
fore I have to say my lesson I will count those
leaves."

Jim obediently picked nine leaves from the haw-
thorn hedge, and little Lucy tied them into her
handkerchief, and then the Japanese gong sounded
and they went back to school.

That night after dinner, just before Lucy went to
bed, she spoke of her own accord to her father and
Miss Martha, a thing which she seldom did. "Jim
Patterson asked me to marry him when I asked him
what seven and two made in my arithmetic lesson,"
said she. She looked with the loveliest round eyes
of innocence first at her father, then at Miss Martha.
Cyril Rose gasped and laid down his newspaper.

"What did you say, little Lucy?" he asked.

"Jim Patterson asked me to marry him when I
asked him to tell me how much seven and two made
in my arithmetic lesson."

Cyril Rose and his cousin Martha looked at each
other.

"Arnold Carruth asked me, too, when a great
big wasp flew on my arm and frightened me."

Cyril and Martha continued to look. The little,
sweet, uncertain voice went on.

"And Johnny Trumbull asked me when I 'most
fell down on the sidewalk; and Lee Westminster
asked me when I wasn't doing anything, and so did
Bubby Harvey."

"What did you tell them?" asked Miss Martha,
in a faint voice.

"I told them I didn't know."

"You had better have the child go to bed now,"
said Cyril. "Good night, little Lucy. Always tell
father everything."

"Yes, father," said little Lucy, and was kissed,
and went away with Martha.

When Martha returned, her cousin looked at her
severely. He was a fair, gentle-looking man, and
severity was impressive when he assumed it.

"Really, Martha," said he, "don't you think you
had better have a little closer outlook over that
baby?"

"Oh, Cyril, I never dreamed of such a thing,"
cried Miss Martha.

"You really must speak to Madame," said Cyril.
"I cannot have such things put into the child's
head."

"Oh, Cyril, how can I?"

"I think it is your duty."

"Cyril, could not -- you?"

Cyril grinned. "Do you think," said he, "that
I am going to that elegant widow schoolma'am and
say, 'Madame, my young daughter has had four
proposals of marriage in one day, and I must beg
you to put a stop to such proceedings'? No, Martha;
it is a woman's place to do such a thing as that.
The whole thing is too absurd, indignant as I am
about it. Poor little soul!"

So it happened that Miss Martha Rose, the next
day being Saturday, called on Madame, but, not
being asked any leading question, found herself abso-
lutely unable to deliver herself of her errand, and
went away with it unfulfilled.

"Well, I must say," said Madame to Miss Par-
malee, as Miss Martha tripped wearily down the
front walk -- "I must say, of all the educated women
who have really been in the world, she is the strang-
est. You and I have done nothing but ask inane
questions, and she has sat waiting for them, and
chirped back like a canary. I am simply worn out."

"So am I," sighed Miss Parmalee.

But neither of them was so worn out as poor
Miss Martha, anticipating her cousin's reproaches.
However, her wonted silence and reticence stood
her in good stead, for he merely asked, after little
Lucy had gone to bed:

"Well, what did Madame say about Lucy's pro-
posals?"

"She did not say anything," replied Martha.

"Did she promise it would not occur again?"

"She did not promise, but I don't think it will."

The financial page was unusually thrilling that
night, and Cyril Rose, who had come to think rather
lightly of the affair, remarked, absent-mindedly;
"Well, I hope it does not occur again. I cannot have
such ridiculous ideas put into the child's head. If
it does, we get a governess for her and take her away
from Madame's." Then he resumed his reading,
and Martha, guilty but relieved, went on with her
knitting.

It was late spring then, and little Lucy had at-
tended Madame's school several months, and her
popularity had never waned. A picnic was planned
to Dover's Grove, and the romantic little girls had
insisted upon a May queen, and Lucy was unani-
mously elected. The pupils of Madame's school went
to the picnic in the manner known as a "straw-
ride." Miss Parmalee sat with them, her feet
uncomfortably tucked under her.   She was the
youngest of the teachers, and could not evade the
duty. Madame and Miss Acton headed the pro-
cession, sitting comfortably in a victoria driven by
the colored man Sam, who was employed about the
school. Dover's Grove was six miles from the vil-
lage, and a favorite spot for picnics. The victoria
rolled on ahead; Madame carried a black parasol,
for the sun was on her side and the day very warm.
Both ladies wore thin, dark gowns, and both felt
the languor of spring.

The straw-wagon, laden with children seated upon
the golden trusses of straw, looked like a wagon-
load of blossoms. Fair and dark heads, rosy faces
looked forth in charming clusters. They sang, they
chattered. It made no difference to them that it
was not the season for a straw-ride, that the trusses
were musty. They inhaled the fragrance of blooming
boughs under which they rode, and were quite ob-
livious to all discomfort and unpleasantness. Poor
Miss Parmalee, with her feet going to sleep, sneezing
from time to time from the odor of the old straw,
did not obtain the full beauty of the spring day.
She had protested against the straw-ride.

"The children really ought to wait until the season
for such things," she had told Madame, quite boldly;
and Madame had replied that she was well aware
of it, but the children wanted something of the sort,
and the hay was not cut, and straw, as it happened,
was more easily procured.

"It may not be so very musty," said Madame;
"and you know, my dear, straw is clean, and I
am sorry, but you do seem to be the one to ride
with the children on the straw, because" -- Madame
dropped her voice -- "you are really younger, you
know, than either Miss Acton or I."

Poor Miss Parmalee could almost have dispensed
with her few years of superior youth to have gotten
rid of that straw-ride. She had no parasol, and the
sun beat upon her head, and the noise of the children
got horribly on her nerves. Little Lucy was her one
alleviation. Little Lucy sat in the midst of the
boisterous throng, perfectly still, crowned with her
garland of leaves and flowers, her sweet, pale little
face calmly observant. She was the high light of
Madame's school, the effect which made the
whole. All the others looked at little Lucy, they
talked to her, they talked at her; but she remained
herself unmoved, as a high light should be. "Dear
little soul," Miss Parmalee thought.  She also
thought that it was a pity that little Lucy could
not have worn a white frock in her character as
Queen of the May, but there she was mistaken. The
blue was of a peculiar shade, of a very soft material,
and nothing could have been prettier. Jim Patterson
did not often look away from little Lucy; neither
did Arnold Carruth; neither did Bubby Harvey;
neither did Johnny Trumbull; neither did Lily
Jennings; neither did many others.

Amelia Wheeler, however, felt a little jealous as
she watched Lily. She thought Lily ought to have
been queen; and she, while she did not dream of
competing with incomparable little Lucy, wished
Lily would not always look at Lucy with such wor-
shipful admiration. Amelia was inconsistent. She
knew that she herself could not aspire to being an
object of worship, but the state of being a nonentity
for Lily was depressing. "Wonder if I jumped out
of this old wagon and got killed if she would mind
one bit?" she thought, tragically. But Amelia did
not jump. She had tragic impulses, or rather im-
aginations of tragic impulses, but she never carried
them out. It was left for little Lucy, flower-crowned
and calmly sweet and gentle under honors, to be
guilty of a tragedy of which she never dreamed.
For that was the day when little Lucy was lost.

When the picnic was over, when the children were
climbing into the straw-wagon and Madame and
Miss Acton were genteelly disposed in the victoria,
a lamentable cry arose. Sam drew his reins tight
and rolled his inquiring eyes around; Madame and
Miss Acton leaned far out on either side of the vic-
toria.

"Oh, what is it?" said Madame. "My dear Miss
Acton, do pray get out and see what the trouble is.
I begin to feel a little faint."

In fact, Madame got her cut-glass smelling-bottle
out of her bag and began to sniff vigorously. Sam
gazed backward and paid no attention to her. Ma-
dame always felt faint when anything unexpected
occurred, and smelled at the pretty bottle, but she
never fainted.

Miss Acton got out, lifting her nice skirts clear
of the dusty wheel, and she scuttled back to the up-
roarious straw-wagon, showing her slender ankles
and trimly shod feet. Miss Acton was a very wiry,
dainty woman, full of nervous energy. When she
reached the straw-wagon Miss Parmalee was climb-
ing out, assisted by the driver. Miss Parmalee
was very pale and visibly tremulous. The children
were all shrieking in dissonance, so it was quite
impossible to tell what the burden of their tale of
woe was; but obviously something of a tragic na-
ture had happened.

"What is the matter?" asked Miss Acton, tee-
tering like a humming-bird with excitement.

"Little Lucy --" gasped Miss Parmalee.

"What about her?"

"She isn't here."

"Where is she?"

"We don't know. We just missed her."

Then the cry of the children for little Lucy Rose,
although sadly wrangled, became intelligible. Ma-
dame came, holding up her silk skirt and sniffing at
her smelling-bottle, and everybody asked ques-
tions of everybody else, and nobody knew any satis-
factory answers. Johnny Trumbull was confident
that he was the last one to see little Lucy, and so
were Lily Jennings and Amelia Wheeler, and so
were Jim Patterson and Bubby Harvey and Arnold
Carruth and Lee Westminster and many others;
but when pinned down to the actual moment
everybody disagreed, and only one thing was cer-
tain -- little Lucy Rose was missing.

"What shall I say to her father?" moaned Ma-
dame.

"Of course, we shall find her before we say any-
thing," returned Miss Parmalee, who was sure to
rise to an emergency. Madame sank helpless be-
fore one. "You had better go and sit under that
tree (Sam, take a cushion out of the carriage for
Madame) and keep quiet; then Sam must drive
to the village and give the alarm, and the straw-
wagon had better go, too; and the rest of us will
hunt by threes, three always keeping together. Re-
member, children, three of you keep together, and,
whatever you do, be sure and do not separate. We
cannot have another lost."

It seemed very sound advice. Madame, pale and
frightened, sat on the cushion under the tree and
sniffed at her smelling-bottle, and the rest scattered
and searched the grove and surrounding underbrush
thoroughly. But it was sunset when the groups
returned to Madame under her tree, and the straw-
wagon with excited people was back, and the victoria
with Lucy's father and the rector and his wife, and
Dr. Trumbull in his buggy, and other carriages fast
arriving. Poor Miss Martha Rose had been out
calling when she heard the news, and she was walk-
ing to the scene of action. The victoria in which
her cousin was seated left her in a cloud of dust.
Cyril Rose had not noticed the mincing figure with
the card-case and the parasol.

The village searched for little Lucy Rose, but it
was Jim Patterson who found her, and in the most
unlikely of places. A forlorn pair with a multi-
plicity of forlorn children lived in a tumble-down
house about half a mile from the grove. The man's
name was Silas Thomas, and his wife's was Sarah.
Poor Sarah had lost a large part of the small wit she
had originally owned several years before, when her
youngest daughter, aged four, died. All the babies
that had arrived since had not consoled her for the
death of that little lamb, by name Viola May, nor
restored her full measure of under-wit. Poor Sarah
Thomas had spied adorable little Lucy separated
from her mates by chance for a few minutes, pick-
ing wild flowers, and had seized her in forcible but
loving arms and carried her home. Had Lucy not
been such a silent, docile child, it could never have
happened; but she was a mere little limp thing in
the grasp of the over-loving, deprived mother who
thought she had gotten back her own beloved Viola
May.

When Jim Patterson, big-eyed and pale, looked
in at the Thomas door, there sat Sarah Thomas, a
large, unkempt, wild-visaged, but gentle creature,
holding little Lucy and cuddling her, while Lucy,
shrinking away as far as she was able, kept her big,
dark eyes of wonder and fear upon the woman's
face. And all around were clustered the Thomas
children, unkempt as their mother, a gentle but
degenerate brood, all of them believing what their
mother said. Viola May had come home again.
Silas Thomas was not there; he was trudging slowly
homeward from a job of wood-cutting. Jim saw
only the mother, little Lucy, and that poor little
flock of children gazing in wonder and awe. Jim
rushed in and faced Sarah Thomas. "Give me
little Lucy!" said he, as fiercely as any man. But
he reckoned without the unreasoning love of a
mother. Sarah only held little Lucy faster, and the
poor little girl rolled appealing eyes at him over that
brawny, grasping arm of affection.

Jim raced for help, and it was not long before it
came. Little Lucy rode home in the victoria, seated
in Sally Patterson's lap. "Mother, you take her,"
Jim had pleaded; and Sally, in the face and eyes of
Madame, had gathered the little trembling crea-
ture into her arms. In her heart she had not much
of an opinion of any woman who had allowed such
a darling little girl out of her sight for a moment.
Madame accepted a seat in another carriage and rode
home, explaining and sniffing and inwardly resolving
never again to have a straw-ride.

Jim stood on the step of the victoria all the way
home. They passed poor Miss Martha Rose, still
faring toward the grove, and nobody noticed her,
for the second time. She did not turn back until
the straw-wagon, which formed the tail of the little
procession, reached her. That she halted with mad
waves of her parasol, and, when told that little Lucy
was found, refused a seat on the straw because she
did not wish to rumple her best gown and turned
about and fared home again.

The rectory was reached before Cyril Rose's
house, and Cyril yielded gratefully to Sally Patter-
son's proposition that she take the little girl with
her, give her dinner, see that she was washed and
brushed and freed from possible contamination from
the Thomases, who were not a cleanly lot, and later
brought home in the rector's carriage. However,
little Lucy stayed all night at the rectory. She had
a bath; her lovely, misty hair was brushed; she
was fed and petted; and finally Sally Patterson
telephoned for permission to keep her overnight.
By that time poor Martha had reached home and
was busily brushing her best dress.

After dinner, little Lucy, very happy and quite
restored, sat in Sally Patterson's lap on the veranda,
while Jim hovered near.  His innocent boy-love
made him feel as if he had wings. But his wings
only bore him to failure, before an earlier and
mightier force of love than his young heart could
yet compass for even such a darling as little Lucy.
He sat on the veranda step and gazed eagerly and
rapturously at little Lucy on his mother's lap, and
the desire to have her away from other loves came
over him. He saw the fireflies dancing in swarms
on the lawn, and a favorite sport of the children of
the village occurred to him.

"Say, little Lucy," said Jim.

Little Lucy looked up with big, dark eyes under
her mist of hair, as she nestled against Sally Patter-
son's shoulder.

"Say, let's chase fireflies, little Lucy."

"Do you want to chase fireflies with Jim, darling?"
asked Sally.

Little Lucy nestled closer. "I would rather stay
with you," said she in her meek flute of a voice,
and she gazed up at Sally with the look which she
might have given the mother she had lost.

Sally kissed her and laughed. Then she reached
down a fond hand and patted her boy's head.
"Never mind, Jim," said Sally. "Mothers have to
come first."




NOBLESSE





NOBLESSE

MARGARET LEE encountered in her late middle
age the rather singular strait of being entirely
alone in the world.  She was unmarried, and as
far as relatives were concerned, she had none except
those connected with her by ties not of blood, but by
marriage.

Margaret had not married when her flesh had been
comparative; later, when it had become superlative,
she had no opportunities to marry. Life would have
been hard enough for Margaret under any circum-
stances, but it was especially hard, living, as she did,
with her father's stepdaughter and that daughter's
husband.

Margaret's stepmother had been a child in spite of
her two marriages, and a very silly, although pretty
child. The daughter, Camille, was like her, although
not so pretty, and the man whom Camille had mar-
ried was what Margaret had been taught to regard
as "common." His business pursuits were irregular
and partook of mystery. He always smoked ciga-
rettes and chewed gum. He wore loud shirts and a
diamond scarf-pin which had upon him the appear-
ance of stolen goods. The gem had belonged to
Margaret's own mother, but when Camille expressed
a desire to present it to Jack Desmond, Margaret
had yielded with no outward hesitation, but after-
ward she wept miserably over its loss when alone in
her room. The spirit had gone out of Margaret,
the little which she had possessed. She had always
been a gentle, sensitive creature, and was almost
helpless before the wishes of others.

After all, it had been a long time since Margaret
had been able to force the ring even upon her little
finger, but she had derived a small pleasure from
the reflection that she owned it in its faded velvet
box, hidden under laces in her top bureau drawer.
She did not like to see it blazing forth from the tie
of this very ordinary young man who had married
Camille. Margaret had a gentle, high-bred contempt
for Jack Desmond, but at the same time a vague
fear of him. Jack had a measure of unscrupulous
business shrewdness, which spared nothing and no-
body, and that in spite of the fact that he had not
succeeded.

Margaret owned the old Lee place, which had been
magnificent, but of late years the expenditures had
been reduced and it had deteriorated. The conserva-
tories had been closed. There was only one horse
in the stable. Jack had bought him. He was a worn-
out trotter with legs carefully bandaged. Jack drove
him at reckless speed, not considering those slender,
braceleted legs. Jack had a racing-gig, and when
in it, with striped coat, cap on one side, cigarette in
mouth, lines held taut, skimming along the roads in
clouds of dust, he thought himself the man and true
sportsman which he was not. Some of the old Lee
silver had paid for that waning trotter.

Camille adored Jack, and cared for no associations,
no society, for which he was not suited. Before the
trotter was bought she told Margaret that the kind
of dinners which she was able to give in Fairhill were
awfully slow. "If we could afford to have some
men out from the city, some nice fellers that Jack
knows, it would be worth while," said she, "but
we have grown so hard up we can't do a thing to
make it worth their while. Those men haven't got
any use for a back-number old place like this. We
can't take them round in autos, nor give them a
chance at cards, for Jack couldn't pay if he lost,
and Jack is awful honorable. We can't have the
right kind of folks here for any fun. I don't propose
to ask the rector and his wife, and old Mr. Harvey,
or people like the Leaches."

"The Leaches are a very good old family," said
Margaret, feebly.

"I don't care for good old families when they are
so slow," retorted Camille. "The fellers we could
have here, if we were rich enough, come from fine
families, but they are up-to-date. It's no use hang-
ing on to old silver dishes we never use and that I
don't intend to spoil my hands shining. Poor Jack
don't have much fun, anyway. If he wants that
trotter -- he says it's going dirt cheap -- I think it's
mean he can't have it, instead of your hanging on to
a lot of out-of-style old silver; so there."

Two generations ago there had been French blood
in Camille's family. She put on her clothes beauti-
fully; she had a dark, rather fine-featured, alert lit-
tle face, which gave a wrong impression, for she was
essentially vulgar. Sometimes poor Margaret Lee
wished that Camille had been definitely vicious, if
only she might be possessed of more of the charac-
teristics of breeding. Camille so irritated Margaret
in those somewhat abstruse traits called sensibilities
that she felt as if she were living with a sort of
spiritual nutmeg-grater. Seldom did Camille speak
that she did not jar Margaret, although uncon-
sciously. Camille meant to be kind to the stout
woman, whom she pitied as far as she was capable
of pitying without understanding. She realized that
it must be horrible to be no longer young, and so
stout that one was fairly monstrous, but how horrible
she could not with her mentality conceive. Jack also
meant to be kind. He was not of the brutal -- that is,
intentionally brutal -- type, but he had a shrewd
eye to the betterment of himself, and no realization
of the torture he inflicted upon those who opposed
that betterment.

For a long time matters had been worse than usual
financially in the Lee house. The sisters had been
left in charge of the sadly dwindled estate, and had
depended upon the judgment, or lack of judgment,
of Jack. He approved of taking your chances and
striking for larger income. The few good old grand-
father securities had been sold, and wild ones from
the very jungle of commerce had been substituted.
Jack, like most of his type, while shrewd, was as
credulous as a child. He lied himself, and expected
all men to tell him the truth. Camille at his bidding
mortgaged the old place, and Margaret dared not
oppose. Taxes were not paid; interest was not paid;
credit was exhausted. Then the house was put up
at public auction, and brought little more than suffi-
cient to pay the creditors. Jack took the balance
and staked it in a few games of chance, and of course
lost. The weary trotter stumbled one day and had
to be shot. Jack became desperate. He frightened
Camille.  He was suddenly morose. He bade Ca-
mille pack, and Margaret also, and they obeyed.
Camille stowed away her crumpled finery in the
bulging old trunks, and Margaret folded daintily her
few remnants of past treasures. She had an old silk
gown or two, which resisted with their rich honesty
the inroads of time, and a few pieces of old lace,
which Camille understood no better than she under-
stood their owner.

Then Margaret and the Desmonds went to the
city and lived in a horrible, tawdry little flat in
a tawdry locality.  Jack roared with bitter mirth
when he saw poor Margaret forced to enter her tiny
room sidewise; Camille laughed also, although she
chided Jack gently. "Mean of you to make fun of
poor Margaret, Jacky dear," she said.

For a few weeks Margaret's life in that flat was
horrible; then it became still worse. Margaret near-
ly filled with her weary, ridiculous bulk her little
room, and she remained there most of the time,
although it was sunny and noisy, its one window
giving on a courtyard strung with clothes-lines and
teeming with boisterous life. Camille and Jack went
trolley-riding, and made shift to entertain a little,
merry but questionable people, who gave them
passes to vaudeville and entertained in their turn
until the small hours. Unquestionably these peo-
ple suggested to Jack Desmond the scheme which
spelled tragedy to Margaret.

She always remembered one little dark man with
keen eyes who had seen her disappearing through
her door of a Sunday night when all these gay, be-
draggled birds were at liberty and the fun ran high.
"Great Scott!" the man had said, and Margaret had
heard him demand of Jack that she be recalled.
She obeyed, and the man was introduced, also the
other members of the party. Margaret Lee stood
in the midst of this throng and heard their repressed
titters of mirth at her appearance. Everybody
there was in good humor with the exception of Jack,
who was still nursing his bad luck, and the little
dark man, whom Jack owed. The eyes of Jack and
the little dark man made Margaret cold with a ter-
ror of something, she knew not what. Before that
terror the shame and mortification of her exhibition
to that merry company was of no import.

She stood among them, silent, immense, clad in
her dark purple silk gown spread over a great hoop-
skirt. A real lace collar lay softly over her enormous,
billowing shoulders; real lace ruffles lay over her
great, shapeless hands. Her face, the delicacy of
whose features was veiled with flesh, flushed and
paled. Not even flesh could subdue the sad brill-
iancy of her dark-blue eyes, fixed inward upon her
own sad state, unregardful of the company. She
made an indefinite murmur of response to the saluta-
tions given her, and then retreated. She heard the
roar of laughter after she had squeezed through the
door of her room. Then she heard eager conversa-
tion, of which she did not catch the real import, but
which terrified her with chance expressions. She
was quite sure that she was the subject of that eager
discussion. She was quite sure that it boded her
no good.

In a few days she knew the worst; and the worst
was beyond her utmost imaginings. This was be-
fore the days of moving-picture shows; it was the
day of humiliating spectacles of deformities, when
inventions of amusements for the people had not
progressed. It was the day of exhibitions of sad
freaks of nature, calculated to provoke tears rather
than laughter in the healthy-minded, and poor Mar-
garet Lee was a chosen victim. Camille informed
her in a few words of her fate. Camille was sorry
for her, although not in the least understanding why
she was sorry. She realized dimly that Margaret
would be distressed, but she was unable from her
narrow point of view to comprehend fully the whole
tragedy.

"Jack has gone broke," stated Camille. "He
owes Bill Stark a pile, and he can't pay a cent of it;
and Jack's sense of honor about a poker debt is
about the biggest thing in his character. Jack has
got to pay. And Bill has a little circus, going to
travel all summer, and he's offered big money for
you. Jack can pay Bill what he owes him, and we'll
have enough to live on, and have lots of fun going
around. You hadn't ought to make a fuss about it."

Margaret, pale as death, stared at the girl, pertly
slim, and common and pretty, who stared back
laughingly, although still with the glimmer of un-
comprehending pity in her black eyes.

"What does -- he -- want -- me -- for?" gasped
Margaret.

"For a show, because you are so big," replied
Camille. "You will make us all rich, Margaret.
Ain't it nice?"

Then Camille screamed, the shrill raucous scream
of the women of her type, for Margaret had fallen
back in a dead faint, her immense bulk inert in her
chair. Jack came running in alarm. Margaret had
suddenly gained value in his shrewd eyes. He was
as pale as she.

Finally Margaret raised her head, opened her
miserable eyes, and regained her consciousness of
herself and what lay before her. There was no course
open but submission. She knew that from the first.
All three faced destitution; she was the one financial
asset, she and her poor flesh. She had to face it,
and with what dignity she could muster.

Margaret had great piety. She kept constantly
before her mental vision the fact in which she be-
lieved, that the world which she found so hard, and
which put her to unspeakable torture, was not all.

A week elapsed before the wretched little show
of which she was to be a member went on the road,
and night after night she prayed. She besieged her
God for strength. She never prayed for respite.
Her realization of the situation and her lofty reso-
lution prevented that. The awful, ridiculous com-
bat was before her; there was no evasion; she prayed
only for the strength which leads to victory.

However, when the time came, it was all worse
than she had imagined. How could a woman gently
born and bred conceive of the horrible ignominy of
such a life? She was dragged hither and yon, to this
and that little town. She traveled through swelter-
ing heat on jolting trains; she slept in tents; she
lived -- she, Margaret Lee -- on terms of equality
with the common and the vulgar. Daily her absurd
unwieldiness was exhibited to crowds screaming with
laughter. Even her faith wavered. It seemed to her
that there was nothing for evermore beyond those
staring, jeering faces of silly mirth and delight at
sight of her, seated in two chairs, clad in a pink
spangled dress, her vast shoulders bare and
sparkling with a tawdry necklace, her great, bare
arms covered with brass bracelets, her hands in-
cased in short, white kid gloves, over the fingers
of which she wore a number of rings -- stage prop-
erties.

Margaret became a horror to herself. At times
it seemed to her that she was in the way of fairly
losing her own identity. It mattered little that
Camille and Jack were very kind to her, that they
showed her the nice things which her terrible earn-
ings had enabled them to have. She sat in her two
chairs -- the two chairs proved a most successful
advertisement -- with her two kid-cushiony hands
clenched in her pink spangled lap, and she suffered
agony of soul, which made her inner self stern and
terrible, behind that great pink mask of face. And
nobody realized until one sultry day when the show
opened at a village in a pocket of green hills -- indeed,
its name was Greenhill -- and Sydney Lord went to
see it.

Margaret, who had schooled herself to look upon
her audience as if they were not, suddenly compre-
hended among them another soul who understood
her own. She met the eyes of the man, and a won-
derful comfort, as of a cool breeze blowing over the
face of clear water, came to her. She knew that the
man understood. She knew that she had his fullest
sympathy. She saw also a comrade in the toils of
comic tragedy, for Sydney Lord was in the same case.
He was a mountain of flesh. As a matter of fact,
had he not been known in Greenhill and respected
as a man of weight of character as well as of body,
and of an old family, he would have rivaled Mar-
garet. Beside him sat an elderly woman, sweet-
faced, slightly bent as to her slender shoulders, as if
with a chronic attitude of submission. She was
Sydney's widowed sister, Ellen Waters. She lived
with her brother and kept his house, and had no
will other than his.

Sydney Lord and his sister remained when the rest
of the audience had drifted out, after the privileged
hand-shakes with the queen of the show.  Every
time a coarse, rustic hand reached familiarly after
Margaret's, Sydney shrank.

He motioned his sister to remain seated when
he approached the stage. Jack Desmond, who
had been exploiting Margaret, gazed at him with
admiring curiosity.   Sydney waved him away
with a commanding gesture. "I wish to speak to
her a moment.   Pray leave the tent," he said,
and Jack obeyed. People always obeyed Sydney
Lord.

Sydney stood before Margaret, and he saw the
clear crystal, which was herself, within all the flesh,
clad in tawdry raiment, and she knew that he saw it.

"Good God!" said Sydney, "you are a lady!"

He continued to gaze at her, and his eyes, large
and brown, became blurred; at the same time his
mouth tightened.

"How came you to be in such a place as this?"
demanded Sydney. He spoke almost as if he were
angry with her.

Margaret explained briefly.

"It is an outrage," declared Sydney. He said
it, however, rather absently.   He was reflecting.
"Where do you live?" he asked.

"Here."

"You mean --?"

"They make up a bed for me here, after the people
have gone."

"And I suppose you had -- before this -- a com-
fortable house."

"The house which my grandfather Lee owned,
the old Lee mansion-house, before we went to the
city. It was a very fine old Colonial house," ex-
plained Margaret, in her finely modulated voice.

"And you had a good room?"

"The southeast chamber had always been mine.
It was very large, and the furniture was old Spanish
mahogany."

"And now --" said Sydney.

"Yes," said Margaret. She looked at him, and
her serious blue eyes seemed to see past him. "It
will not last," she said.

"What do you mean?"

"I try to learn a lesson. I am a child in the school
of God. My lesson is one that always ends in peace."

"Good God!" said Sydney.

He motioned to his sister, and Ellen approached
in a frightened fashion. Her brother could do no
wrong, but this was the unusual, and alarmed her.

"This lady --" began Sydney.

"Miss Lee," said Margaret. "I was never mar-
ried. I am Miss Margaret Lee."

"This," said Sydney, "is my sister Ellen, Mrs.
Waters. Ellen, I wish you to meet Miss Lee."

Ellen took into her own Margaret's hand, and said
feebly that it was a beautiful day and she hoped
Miss Lee found Greenhill a pleasant place to -- visit.

Sydney moved slowly out of the tent and found
Jack Desmond. He was standing near with Camille,
who looked her best in a pale-blue summer silk and
a black hat trimmed with roses. Jack and Camille
never really knew how the great man had managed,
but presently Margaret had gone away with him
and his sister.

Jack and Camille looked at each other.

"Oh, Jack, ought you to have let her go?" said
Camille.

"What made you let her go?" asked Jack.

"I -- don't know. I couldn't say anything. That
man has a tremendous way with him. Goodness!"

"He is all right here in the place, anyhow," said
Jack. "They look up to him. He is a big-bug here.
Comes of a family like Margaret's, though he hasn't
got much money. Some chaps were braggin' that
they had a bigger show than her right here, and I
found out."

"Suppose," said Camille, "Margaret does not
come back?"

"He could not keep her without bein' arrested,"
declared Jack, but he looked uneasy. He had, how-
ever, looked uneasy for some time. The fact was,
Margaret had been very gradually losing weight.
Moreover, she was not well. That very night, after
the show was over, Bill Stark, the little dark man,
had a talk with the Desmonds about it.

"Truth is, before long, if you don't look out, you'll
have to pad her," said Bill; "and giants don't
amount to a row of pins after that begins."

Camille looked worried and sulky. "She ain't
very well, anyhow," said she. "I ain't going to
kill Margaret."

"It's a good thing she's got a chance to have a
night's rest in a house," said Bill Stark.

"The fat man has asked her to stay with him and
his sister while the show is here," said Jack.

"The sister invited her," said Camille, with a
little stiffness. She was common, but she had lived
with Lees, and her mother had married a Lee. She
knew what was due Margaret, and also due herself.

"The truth is," said Camille, "this is an awful sort
of life for a woman like Margaret. She and her
folks were never used to anything like it."

"Why didn't you make your beauty husband
hustle and take care of her and you, then?" de-
manded Bill, who admired Camille, and disliked her
because she had no eyes for him.

"My husband has been unfortunate. He has
done the best he could," responded Camille. "Come,
Jack; no use talking about it any longer. Guess
Margaret will pick up. Come along. I'm tired out."

That night Margaret Lee slept in a sweet chamber
with muslin curtains at the windows, in a massive
old mahogany bed, much like hers which had been
sacrificed at an auction sale. The bed-linen was
linen, and smelled of lavender. Margaret was too
happy to sleep. She lay in the cool, fragrant sheets
and was happy, and convinced of the presence of
the God to whom she had prayed. All night Sydney
Lord sat down-stairs in his book-walled sanctum
and studied over the situation. It was a crucial one.
The great psychological moment of Sydney Lord's
life for knight-errantry had arrived. He studied
the thing from every point of view. There was no
romance about it. These were hard, sordid, tragic,
ludicrous facts with which he had to deal. He knew
to a nicety the agonies which Margaret suffered.
He knew, because of his own capacity for sufferings
of like stress. "And she is a woman and a lady,"
he said, aloud.

If Sydney had been rich enough, the matter would
have been simple. He could have paid Jack and
Camille enough to quiet them, and Margaret could
have lived with him and his sister and their two old
servants. But he was not rich; he was even poor.
The price to be paid for Margaret's liberty was a
bitter one, but it was that or nothing. Sydney faced
it. He looked about the room. To him the walls
lined with the dull gleams of old books were lovely.
There was an oil portrait of his mother over the
mantel-shelf. The weather was warm now, and
there was no need for a hearth fire, but how ex-
quisitely home-like and dear that room could be
when the snow drove outside and there was the leap
of flame on the hearth! Sydney was a scholar and
a gentleman. He had led a gentle and sequestered
life. Here in his native village there were none to
gibe and sneer. The contrast of the traveling show
would be as great for him as it had been for Margaret,
but he was the male of the species, and she the
female. Chivalry, racial, harking back to the begin-
ning of nobility in the human, to its earliest dawn,
fired Sydney. The pale daylight invaded the study.
Sydney, as truly as any knight of old, had girded
himself, and with no hope, no thought of reward,
for the battle in the eternal service of the strong
for the weak, which makes the true worth of the
strong.

There was only one way. Sydney Lord took it.
His sister was spared the knowledge of the truth
for a long while. When she knew, she did not lament;
since Sydney had taken the course, it must be right.
As for Margaret, not knowing the truth, she yielded.
She was really on the verge of illness. Her spirit
was of too fine a strain to enable her body to endure
long. When she was told that she was to remain
with Sydney's sister while Sydney went away on
business, she made no objection. A wonderful sense
of relief, as of wings of healing being spread under
her despair, was upon her. Camille came to bid
her good-by.

"I hope you have a nice visit in this lovely house,"
said Camille, and kissed her. Camille was astute,
and to be trusted. She did not betray Sydney's
confidence. Sydney used a disguise -- a dark wig
over his partially bald head and a little make-up --
and he traveled about with the show and sat on
three chairs, and shook hands with the gaping crowd,
and was curiously happy. It was discomfort; it
was ignominy; it was maddening to support by the
exhibition of his physical deformity a perfectly
worthless young couple like Jack and Camille Des-
mond, but it was all superbly ennobling for the man
himself.

Always as he sat on his three chairs, immense,
grotesque -- the more grotesque for his splendid dig-
nity of bearing -- there was in his soul of a gallant
gentleman the consciousness of that other, whom
he was shielding from a similar ordeal. Compassion
and generosity, so great that they comprehended
love itself and excelled its highest type, irradiated
the whole being of the fat man exposed to the gaze
of his inferiors. Chivalry, which rendered him almost
god-like, strengthened him for his task. Sydney
thought always of Margaret as distinct from her
physical self, a sort of crystalline, angelic soul, with
no encumbrance of earth. He achieved a purely
spiritual conception of her. And Margaret, living
again her gentle lady life, was likewise ennobled
by a gratitude which transformed her. Always a
clear and beautiful soul, she gave out new lights of
character like a jewel in the sun. And she also
thought of Sydney as distinct from his physical self.
The consciousness of the two human beings, one of
the other, was a consciousness as of two wonderful
lines of good and beauty, moving for ever parallel,
separate, and inseparable in an eternal harmony of
spirit.





CORONATION





CORONATION

JIM BENNET had never married. He had
passed middle life, and possessed considerable
property. Susan Adkins kept house for him. She
was a widow and a very distant relative. Jim had
two nieces, his brother's daughters. One, Alma
Beecher, was married; the other, Amanda, was not.
The nieces had naively grasping views concerning
their uncle and his property. They stated freely
that they considered him unable to care for it; that
a guardian should be appointed and the property
be theirs at once. They consulted Lawyer Thomas
Hopkinson with regard to it; they discoursed at
length upon what they claimed to be an idiosyn-
crasy of Jim's, denoting failing mental powers.

"He keeps a perfect slew of cats, and has a coal
fire for them in the woodshed all winter," said Amanda.

"Why in thunder shouldn't he keep a fire in the
woodshed if he wants to?" demanded Hopkinson.
"I know of no law against it. And there isn't a
law in the country regulating the number of cats a
man can keep." Thomas Hopkinson, who was an
old friend of Jim's, gave his prominent chin an up-
ward jerk as he sat in his office arm-chair before
his clients.

"There is something besides cats," said Alma

"What?"

"He talks to himself."

"What in creation do you expect the poor man to
do? He can't talk to Susan Adkins about a blessed
thing except tidies and pincushions. That woman
hasn't a thought in her mind outside her soul's
salvation and fancy-work. Jim has to talk once in
a while to keep himself a man. What if he does
talk to himself? I talk to myself. Next thing you will
want to be appointed guardian over me, Amanda."

Hopkinson was a bachelor, and Amanda flushed
angrily.

"He wasn't what I call even gentlemanly," she
told Alma, when the two were on their way home.

"I suppose Tom Hopkinson thought you were
setting your cap at him," retorted Alma. She rel-
ished the dignity of her married state, and enjoyed
giving her spinster sister little claws when occasion
called. However, Amanda had a temper of her own,
and she could claw back.

"YOU needn't talk," said she. "You only took
Joe Beecher when you had given up getting anybody
better. You wanted Tom Hopkinson yourself. I
haven't forgotten that blue silk dress you got and
wore to meeting. You needn't talk. You know
you got that dress just to make Tom look at you,
and he didn't. You needn't talk."

"I wouldn't have married Tom Hopkinson if he
had been the only man on the face of the earth,"
declared Alma with dignity; but she colored hotly.

Amanda sniffed. "Well, as near as I can find out
Uncle Jim can go on talking to himself and keeping
cats, and we can't do anything," said she.

When the two women were home, they told Alma's
husband, Joe Beecher, about their lack of success.
They were quite heated with their walk and excite-
ment. "I call it a shame," said Alma. "Anybody
knows that poor Uncle Jim would be better off with
a guardian."

"Of course," said Amanda. "What man that
had a grain of horse sense would do such a crazy
thing as to keep a coal fire in a woodshed?"

"For such a slew of cats, too," said Alma, nodding
fiercely.

Alma's husband, Joe Beecher, spoke timidly and
undecidedly in the defense. "You know," he said,
"that Mrs. Adkins wouldn't have those cats in the
house, and cats mostly like to sit round where it's
warm."

His wife regarded him. Her nose wrinkled. "I
suppose next thing YOU'LL be wanting to have a cat
round where it's warm, right under my feet, with
all I have to do," said she. Her voice had an actual
acidity of sound.

Joe gasped. He was a large man with a constant
expression of wondering inquiry. It was the expres-
sion of his babyhood; he had never lost it, and it
was an expression which revealed truly the state of
his mind. Always had Joe Beecher wondered, first
of all at finding himself in the world at all, then at
the various happenings of existence. He probably
wondered more about the fact of his marriage with
Alma Bennet than anything else, although he never
betrayed his wonder. He was always painfully
anxious to please his wife, of whom he stood in
awe. Now he hastened to reply: "Why, no, Alma;
of course I won't."

"Because," said Alma, "I haven't come to my
time of life, through all the trials I've had, to be
taking any chances of breaking my bones over any
miserable, furry, four-footed animal that wouldn't
catch a mouse if one run right under her nose."

"I don't want any cat," repeated Joe, miserably.
His fear and awe of the two women increased.
When his sister-in-law turned upon him he fairly
cringed.

"Cats!" said Amanda. Then she sniffed. The
sniff was worse than speech.

Joe repeated in a mumble that he didn't want
any cats, and went out, closing the door softly after
him, as he had been taught. However, he was en-
tirely sure, in the depths of his subjugated masculine
mind, that his wife and her sister had no legal au-
thority whatever to interfere with their uncle's right
to keep a hundred coal fires in his woodshed, for a
thousand cats. He always had an inner sense of
glee when he heard the two women talk over the
matter. Once Amanda had declared that she did
not believe that Tom Hopkinson knew much about
law, anyway.

"He seems to stand pretty high," Joe ventured
with the utmost mildness.

"Yes, he does," admitted Alma, grudgingly.

"It does not follow he knows law," persisted
Amanda, "and it MAY follow that he likes cats.
There was that great Maltese tommy brushing round
all the time we were in his office, but I didn't dare
shoo him off for fear it might be against the law."
Amanda laughed, a very disagreeable little laugh.
Joe said nothing, but inwardly he chuckled. It was
the cause of man with man. He realized a great,
even affectionate, understanding of Jim.

The day after his nieces had visited the lawyer's
office, Jim was preparing to call on his friend Edward
Hayward, the minister. Before leaving he looked
carefully after the fire in the woodshed. The stove
was large. Jim piled on the coal, regardless out-
wardly that the housekeeper, Susan Adkins, had
slammed the kitchen door to indicate her contempt.
Inwardly Jim felt hurt, but he had felt hurt so long
from the same cause that the sensation had become
chronic, and was borne with a gentle patience.
Moreover, there was something which troubled him
more and was the reason for his contemplated call
on his friend. He evened the coals on the fire with
great care, and replenished from the pail in the ice-
box the cats' saucers. There was a circle of clean
white saucers around the stove. Jim owned many
cats; counting the kittens, there were probably over
twenty. Mrs. Adkins counted them in the sixties.
"Those sixty-seven cats," she said.

Jim often gave away cats when he was confident
of securing good homes, but supply exceeded the
demand. Now and then tragedies took place in
that woodshed. Susan Adkins came bravely to the
front upon these occasions. Quite convinced was
Susan Adkins that she had a good home, and it
behooved her to keep it, and she did not in the least
object to drowning, now and then, a few very young
kittens. She did this with neatness and despatch
while Jim walked to the store on an errand and was
supposed to know nothing about it. There was
simply not enough room in his woodshed for the
accumulation of cats, although his heart could have
held all.

That day, as he poured out the milk, cats of all
ages and sizes and colors purred in a softly padding
multitude around his feet, and he regarded them
with love. There were tiger cats, Maltese cats, black-
and-white cats, black cats and white cats, tommies
and females, and his heart leaped to meet the plead-
ing mews of all. The saucers were surrounded.
Little pink tongues lapped. "Pretty pussy! pretty
pussy!" cooed Jim, addressing them in general. He
put on his overcoat and hat, which he kept on a peg
behind the door. Jim had an arm-chair in the wood-
shed. He always sat there when he smoked; Susan
Adkins demurred at his smoking in the house, which
she kept so nice, and Jim did not dream of rebellion.
He never questioned the right of a woman to bar
tobacco smoke from a house. Before leaving he
refilled some of the saucers. He was not sure that
all of the cats were there; some might be afield,
hunting, and he wished them to find refreshment
when they returned. He stroked the splendid striped
back of a great tiger tommy which filled his arm-
chair. This cat was his special pet. He fastened the
outer shed door with a bit of rope in order that it
might not blow entirely open, and yet allow his
feline friends to pass, should they choose. Then he
went out.

The day was clear, with a sharp breath of frost.
The fields gleamed with frost, offering to the eye a
fine shimmer as of diamond-dust under the brilliant
blue sky, overspread in places with a dapple of little
white clouds.

"White frost and mackerel sky; going to be falling
weather," Jim said, aloud, as he went out of the
yard, crunching the crisp grass under heel.

Susan Adkins at a window saw his lips moving.
His talking to himself made her nervous, although it
did not render her distrustful of his sanity. It was
fortunate that Susan had not told Jim that she
disliked his habit. In that case he would have
deprived himself of that slight solace; he would not
have dreamed of opposing Susan's wishes. Jim had
a great pity for the nervous whims, as he regarded
them, of women -- a pity so intense and tender that
it verged on respect and veneration. He passed his
nieces' house on the way to the minister's, and both
were looking out of windows and saw his lips moving.

"There he goes, talking to himself like a crazy
loon," said Amanda.

Alma nodded.

Jim went on, blissfully unconscious. He talked
in a quiet monotone; only now and then his voice
rose; only now and then there were accompanying
gestures. Jim had a straight mile down the broad
village street to walk before he reached the church
and the parsonage beside it.

Jim and the minister had been friends since boy-
hood. They were graduates and classmates of the
same college. Jim had had unusual educational ad-
vantages for a man coming from a simple family.
The front door of the parsonage flew open when Jim
entered the gate, and the minister stood there
smiling. He was a tall, thin man with a wide mouth,
which either smiled charmingly or was set with
severity. He was as brown and dry as a wayside
weed which winter had subdued as to bloom but
could not entirely prostrate with all its icy storms
and compelling blasts. Jim, advancing eagerly tow-
ard the warm welcome in the door, was a small
man, and bent at that, but he had a handsome old
face, with the rose of youth on the cheeks and the
light of youth in the blue eyes, and the quick changes
of youth, before emotions, about the mouth.

"Hullo, Jim!" cried Dr. Edward Hayward. Hay-
ward, for a doctor of divinity, was considered some-
what lacking in dignity at times; still, he was Dr.
Hayward, and the failing was condoned. More-
over, he was a Hayward, and the Haywards had
been, from the memory of the oldest inhabitant, the
great people of the village. Dr. Hayward's house
was presided over by his widowed cousin, a lady
of enough dignity to make up for any lack of it in
the minister. There were three servants, besides
the old butler who had been Hayward's attendant
when he had been a young man in college. Village
people were proud of their minister, with his degree
and what they considered an imposing household
retinue.

Hayward led, and Jim followed, to the least pre-
tentious room in the house -- not the study proper,
which was lofty, book-lined, and leather-furnished,
curtained with broad sweeps of crimson damask, but
a little shabby place back of it, accessible by a nar-
row door. The little room was lined with shelves;
they held few books, but a collection of queer and
dusty things -- strange weapons, minerals, odds and
ends -- which the minister loved and with which his
lady cousin never interfered.

"Louisa," Hayward had told his cousin when she
entered upon her post, "do as you like with the
whole house, but let my little study alone. Let it
look as if it had been stirred up with a garden-rake
-- that little room is my territory, and no disgrace
to you, my dear, if the dust rises in clouds at every
step."

Jim was as fond of the little room as his friend.
He entered, and sighed a great sigh of satisfaction
as he sank into the shabby, dusty hollow of a large
chair before the hearth fire. Immediately a black
cat leaped into his lap, gazed at him with green-
jewel eyes, worked her paws, purred, settled into a
coil, and slept. Jim lit his pipe and threw the match
blissfully on the floor. Dr. Hayward set an electric
coffee-urn at its work, for the little room was a
curious mixture of the comfortable old and the
comfortable modern.

"Sam shall serve our luncheon in here," he said,
with a staid glee.

Jim nodded happily.

"Louisa will not mind," said Hayward. "She is
precise, but she has a fine regard for the rights of the
individual, which is most commendable." He seated
himself in a companion chair to Jim's, lit his own
pipe, and threw the match on the floor. Occasion-
ally, when the minister was out, Sam, without orders
so to do, cleared the floor of matches.

Hayward smoked and regarded his friend, who
looked troubled despite his comfort. "What is it,
Jim?" asked the minister at last.

"I don't know how to do what is right for me to
do," replied the little man, and his face, turned
toward his friend, had the puzzled earnestness of a
child.

Hayward laughed. It was easily seen that his
was the keener mind.  In natural endowments
there had never been equality, although there was
great similarity of tastes. Jim, despite his education,
often lapsed into the homely vernacular of which he
heard so much. An involuntarily imitative man in
externals was Jim, but essentially an original. Jim
proceeded.

"You know, Edward, I have never been one to
complain," he said, with an almost boyish note
of apology.

"Never complained half enough; that's the trou-
ble," returned the other.

"Well, I overheard something Mis' Adkins said
to Mis' Amos Trimmer the other afternoon. Mis'
Trimmer was calling on Mis' Adkins. I couldn't
help overhearing unless I went outdoors, and it
was snowing and I had a cold. I wasn't listening."

"Had a right to listen if you wanted to," declared
Hayward, irascibly.

"Well, I couldn't help it unless I went outdoors.
Mis' Adkins she was in the kitchen making light-
bread for supper, and Mis' Trimmer had sat right
down there with her. Mis' Adkins's kitchen is as
clean as a parlor, anyway. Mis' Adkins said to Mis'
Trimmer, speaking of me -- because Mis' Trimmer
had just asked where I was and Mis' Adkins had
said I was out in the woodshed sitting with the cats
and smoking -- Mis' Adkins said, 'He's just a door-
mat, that's what he is.' Then Mis' Trimmer says,
'The way he lets folks ride over him beats me.'
Then Mis' Adkins says again: 'He's nothing but a
door-mat. He lets everybody that wants to just
trample on him and grind their dust into him, and
he acts real pleased and grateful.'"

Hayward's face flushed. "Did Mrs. Adkins men-
tion that she was one of the people who used you
for a door-mat?" he demanded.

Jim threw back his head and laughed like a child,
with the sweetest sense of unresentful humor. "Lord
bless my soul, Edward," replied Jim, "I don't be-
lieve she ever thought of that."

"And at that very minute you, with a hard cold,
were sitting out in that draughty shed smoking
because she wouldn't allow you to smoke in your
own house!"

"I don't mind that, Edward," said Jim, and
laughed again.

"Could you see to read your paper out there,
with only that little shed window? And don't you
like to read your paper while you smoke?"

"Oh yes," admitted Jim; "but my! I don't mind
little things like that! Mis' Adkins is only a poor
widow woman, and keeping my house nice and not
having it smell of tobacco is all she's got. They can
talk about women's rights -- I feel as if they ought
to have them fast enough, if they want them, poor
things; a woman has a hard row to hoe, and will
have, if she gets all the rights in creation. But I
guess the rights they'd find it hardest to give up
would be the rights to have men look after them
just a little more than they look after other men,
just because they are women. When I think of
Annie Berry -- the girl I was going to marry, you
know, if she hadn't died -- I feel as if I couldn't do
enough for another woman. Lord! I'm glad to sit
out in the woodshed and smoke. Mis' Adkins is
pretty good-natured to stand all the cats."

Then the coffee boiled, and Hayward poured out
some for Jim and himself. He had a little silver ser-
vice at hand, and willow-ware cups and saucers.
Presently Sam appeared, and Hayward gave orders
concerning luncheon.

"Tell Miss Louisa we are to have it served here,"
said he, "and mind, Sam, the chops are to be thick
and cooked the way we like them; and don't forget
the East India chutney, Sam."

"It does seem rather a pity that you cannot have
chutney at home with your chops, when you are so
fond of it," remarked Hayward when Sam had gone.

"Mis' Adkins says it will give me liver trouble,
and she isn't strong enough to nurse."

"So you have to eat her ketchup?"

"Well, she doesn't put seasoning in it," admitted
Jim. "But Mis' Adkins doesn't like seasoning her-
self, and I don't mind."

"And I know the chops are never cut thick, the
way we like them."

"Mis' Adkins likes her meat well done, and she
can't get such thick chops well done. I suppose our
chops are rather thin, but I don't mind."

"Beefsteak and chops, both cut thin, and fried
up like sole-leather. I know!" said Dr. Hayward,
and he stamped his foot with unregenerate force.

"I don't mind a bit, Edward."

"You ought to mind, when it is your own house,
and you buy the food and pay your housekeeper.
It is an outrage!"

"I don't mind, really, Edward."

Dr. Hayward regarded Jim with a curious ex-
pression compounded of love, anger, and contempt.
"Any more talk of legal proceedings?" he asked,
brusquely.

Jim flushed. "Tom ought not to tell of that."

"Yes, he ought; he ought to tell it all over town.
He doesn't, but he ought. It is an outrage! Here
you have been all these years supporting your
nieces, and they are working away like field-mice,
burrowing under your generosity, trying to get a
chance to take action and appropriate your property
and have you put under a guardian."

"I don't mind a bit," said Jim; "but --"

The other man looked inquiringly at him, and,
seeing a pitiful working of his friend's face, he
jumped up and got a little jar from a shelf. "We
will drop the whole thing until we have had our
chops and chutney," said he. "You are right; it is
not worth minding. Here is a new brand of tobacco
I want you to try. I don't half like it, myself, but
you may."

Jim, with a pleased smile, reached out for the
tobacco, and the two men smoked until Sam brought
the luncheon. It was well cooked and well served
on an antique table. Jim was thoroughly happy.
It was not until the luncheon was over and another
pipe smoked that the troubled, perplexed expression
returned to his face.

"Now," said Hayward, "out with it!"

"It is only the old affair about Alma and Amanda,
but now it has taken on a sort of new aspect."

"What do you mean by a new aspect?"

"It seems," said Jim, slowly, "as if they were
making it so I couldn't do for them."

Hayward stamped his foot. "That does sound
new," he said, dryly. "I never thought Alma
Beecher or Amanda Bennet ever objected to have
you do for them."

"Well," said Jim, "perhaps they don't now, but
they want me to do it in their own way. They
don't want to feel as if I was giving and they taking;
they want it to seem the other way round. You
see, if I were to deed over my property to them, and
then they allowance me, they would feel as if they
were doing the giving."

"Jim, you wouldn't be such a fool as that?"

"No, I wouldn't," replied Jim, simply. "They
wouldn't know how to take care of it, and Mis'
Adkins would be left to shift for herself. Joe Beecher
is real good-hearted, but he always lost every dollar
he touched. No, there wouldn't be any sense in
that. I don't mean to give in, but I do feel pretty
well worked up over it."

"What have they said to you?"

Jim hesitated.

"Out with it, now. One thing you may be sure
of: nothing that you can tell me will alter my opinion
of your two nieces for the worse. As for poor Joe
Beecher, there is no opinion, one way or the other.
What did they say?"

Jim regarded his friend with a curiously sweet,
far-off expression. "Edward," he said, "sometimes
I believe that the greatest thing a man's friends can
do for him is to drive him into a corner with God;
to be so unjust to him that they make him under-
stand that God is all that mortal man is meant to
have, and that is why he finds out that most people,
especially the ones he does for, don't care for
him."

Hayward looked solemnly and tenderly at the
other's almost rapt face. "You are right, I suppose,
old man," said he; "but what did they do?"

"They called me in there about a week ago and
gave me an awful talking to."

"About what?"

Jim looked at his friend with dignity. "They
were two women talking, and they went into little
matters not worth repeating," said he. "All is --
they seemed to blame me for everything I had ever
done for them, and for everything I had ever done,
anyway. They seemed to blame me for being born
and living, and, most of all, for doing anything for
them."

"It is an outrage!" declared Hayward. "Can't
you see it?"

"I can't seem to see anything plain about it,"
returned Jim, in a bewildered way. "I always sup-
posed a man had to do something bad to be given
a talking to; but it isn't so much that, and I don't
bear any malice against them. They are only two
women, and they are nervous. What worries me is,
they do need things, and they can't get on and be
comfortable unless I do for them; but if they are
going to feel that way about it, it seems to cut me
off from doing, and that does worry me, Edward."

The other man stamped. "Jim Bennet," he said,
"they have talked, and now I am going to."

"You, Edward?"

"Yes, I am. It is entirely true what those two
women, Susan Adkins and Mrs. Trimmer, said about
you. You ARE a door-mat, and you ought to be
ashamed of yourself for it. A man should be a man,
and not a door-mat. It is the worst thing in the
world for people to walk over him and trample him.
It does them much more harm than it does him. In
the end the trampler is much worse off than the
trampled upon. Jim Bennet, your being a door-
mat may cost other people their souls' salvation.
You are selfish in the grain to be a door-mat."

Jim turned pale. His child-like face looked sud-
denly old with his mental effort to grasp the other's
meaning. In fact, he was a child -- one of the little
ones of the world -- although he had lived the span
of a man's life. Now one of the hardest problems of
the elders of the world was presented to him. "You
mean --" he said, faintly.

"I mean, Jim, that for the sake of other people,
if not for your own sake, you ought to stop being
a door-mat and be a man in this world of men."

"What do you want me to do?"

"I want you to go straight to those nieces of yours
and tell them the truth. You know what your
wrongs are as well as I do. You know what those
two women are as well as I do. They keep the letter
of the Ten Commandments -- that is right. They
attend my church -- that is right. They scour the
outside of the platter until it is bright enough to
blind those people who don't understand them; but
inwardly they are petty, ravening wolves of greed and
ingratitude. Go and tell them; they don't know
themselves. Show them what they are. It is your
Christian duty."

"You don't mean for me to stop doing for them?"

"I certainly do mean just that -- for a while,
anyway."

"They can't possibly get along, Edward; they
will suffer."

"They have a little money, haven't they?"

"Only a little in savings-bank. The interest pays
their taxes."

"And you gave them that?"

Jim colored.

"Very well, their taxes are paid for this year;
let them use that money. They will not suffer, ex-
cept in their feelings, and that is where they ought
to suffer. Man, you would spoil all the work of the
Lord by your selfish tenderness toward sinners!"

"They aren't sinners."

"Yes, they are -- spiritual sinners, the worst kind
in the world. Now --"

"You don't mean for me to go now?"

"Yes, I do -- now. If you don't go now you never
will. Then, afterward, I want you to go home and
sit in your best parlor and smoke, and have all your
cats in there, too."

Jim gasped. "But, Edward! Mis' Adkins --"

"I don't care about Mrs. Adkins. She isn't as
bad as the rest, but she needs her little lesson,
too."

"Edward, the way that poor woman works to
keep the house nice -- and she don't like the smell
of tobacco smoke."

"Never mind whether she likes it or not. You
smoke."

"And she don't like cats."

"Never mind. Now you go."

Jim stood up. There was a curious change in his
rosy, child-like face. There was a species of quicken-
ing. He looked at once older and more alert. His
friend's words had charged him as with electricity.
When he went down the street he looked taller.

Amanda Bennet and Alma Beecher, sitting sewing
at their street windows, made this mistake.

"That isn't Uncle Jim," said Amanda. "That
man is a head taller, but he looks a little like him."

"It can't be Uncle Jim," agreed Alma. Then
both started.

"It is Uncle Jim, and he is coming here," said
Amanda.

Jim entered. Nobody except himself, his nieces,
and Joe Beecher ever knew exactly what happened,
what was the aspect of the door-mat erected to
human life, of the worm turned to menace. It must
have savored of horror, as do all meek and down-
trodden things when they gain, driven to bay, the
strength to do battle. It must have savored of the
god-like, when the man who had borne with patience,
dignity, and sorrow for them the stings of lesser
things because they were lesser things, at last arose
and revealed himself superior, with a great height of
the spirit, with the power to crush.

When Jim stopped talking and went home, two
pale, shocked faces of women gazed after him from
the windows. Joe Beecher was sobbing like a child.
Finally his wife turned her frightened face upon him,
glad to have still some one to intimidate.

"For goodness' sake, Joe Beecher, stop crying
like a baby," said she, but she spoke in a queer whis-
per, for her lips were stiff.

Joe stood up and made for the door.

"Where are you going?" asked his wife.

"Going to get a job somewhere," replied Joe, and
went. Soon the women saw him driving a neighbor's
cart up the street.

"He's going to cart gravel for John Leach's new
sidewalk!" gasped Alma.

"Why don't you stop him?" cried her sister.
"You can't have your husband driving a tip-cart
for John Leach. Stop him, Alma!"

"I can't stop him," moaned Alma. "I don't
feel as if I could stop anything."

Her sister gazed at her, and the same expression
was on both faces, making them more than sisters
of the flesh. Both saw before them a stern boundary
wall against which they might press in vain for the
rest of their lives, and both saw the same sins of
their hearts.

Meantime Jim Bennet was seated in his best
parlor and Susan Adkins was whispering to Mrs.
Trimmer out in the kitchen.

"I don't know whether he's gone stark, staring
mad or not," whispered Susan, "but he's in the
parlor smoking his worst old pipe, and that big
tiger tommy is sitting in his lap, and he's let in all
the other cats, and they're nosing round, and I
don't dare drive 'em out. I took up the broom, then
I put it away again. I never knew Mr. Bennet
to act so. I can't think what's got into him."

"Did he say anything?"

"No, he didn't say much of anything, but he said
it in a way that made my flesh fairly creep. Says he,
'As long as this is my house and my furniture and
my cats, Mis' Adkins, I think I'll sit down in the
parlor, where I can see to read my paper and smoke
at the same time.' Then he holds the kitchen door
open, and he calls, 'Kitty, kitty, kitty!' and that
great tiger tommy comes in with his tail up, rubbing
round his legs, and all the other cats followed after.
I shut the door before these last ones got into the
parlor." Susan Adkins regarded malevolently the
three tortoise-shell cats of three generations and vari-
ous stages of growth, one Maltese settled in a purring
round of comfort with four kittens, and one perfectly
black cat, which sat glaring at her with beryl-colored
eyes.

"That black cat looks evil," said Mrs. Trimmer.

"Yes, he does. I don't know why I didn't drown
him when he was a kitten."

"Why didn't you drown all those Malty kittens?"

"The old cat hid them away until they were too
big. Then he wouldn't let me. What do you sup-
pose has come to him? Just smell that awful pipe!"

"Men do take queer streaks every now and then,"
said Mrs. Trimmer. "My husband used to, and he
was as good as they make 'em, poor man. He
would eat sugar on his beefsteak, for one thing.
The first time I saw him do it I was scared. I
thought he was plum crazy, but afterward I found
out it was just because he was a man, and his ma
hadn't wanted him to eat sugar when he was a boy.
Mr. Bennet will get over it."

"He don't act as if he would."

"Oh yes, he will. Jim Bennet never stuck to
anything but being Jim Bennet for very long in
his life, and this ain't being Jim Bennet."

"He is a very good man," said Susan with a
somewhat apologetic tone.

"He's too good."

"He's too good to cats."

"Seems to me he's too good to 'most everybody.
Think what he has done for Amanda and Alma, and
how they act!"

"Yes, they are ungrateful and real mean to him;
and I feel sometimes as if I would like to tell them
just what I think of them," said Susan Adkins.
"Poor man, there he is, studying all the time what
he can do for people, and he don't get very much
himself."

Mrs. Trimmer arose to take leave. She had a
long, sallow face, capable of a sarcastic smile.
"Then," said she, "if I were you I wouldn't begrudge
him a chair in the parlor and a chance to read and
smoke and hold a pussy-cat."

"Who said I was begrudging it? I can air out the
parlor when he's got over the notion."

"Well, he will, so you needn't worry," said Mrs.
Trimmer. As she went down the street she could
see Jim's profile beside the parlor window, and she
smiled her sarcastic smile, which was not altogether
unpleasant. "He's stopped smoking, and he ain't
reading," she told herself. "It won't be very long
before he's Jim Bennet again."

But it was longer than she anticipated, for Jim's
will was propped by Edward Hayward's. Edward
kept Jim to his standpoint for weeks, until a few
days before Christmas. Then came self-assertion,
that self-assertion of negation which was all that
Jim possessed in such a crisis. He called upon Dr.
Hayward; the two were together in the little study
for nearly an hour, and talk ran high, then Jim
prevailed.

"It's no use, Edward," he said; "a man can't
be made over when he's cut and dried in one fashion,
the way I am. Maybe I'm doing wrong, but to me
it looks like doing right, and there's something in
the Bible about every man having his own right
and wrong. If what you say is true, and I am hin-
dering the Lord Almighty in His work, then it is
for Him to stop me. He can do it. But meantime
I've got to go on doing the way I always have. Joe
has been trying to drive that tip-cart, and the horse
ran away with him twice. Then he let the cart fall
on his foot and mash one of his toes, and he can
hardly get round, and Amanda and Alma don't dare
touch that money in the bank for fear of not having
enough to pay the taxes next year in case I don't
help them. They only had a little money on hand
when I gave them that talking to, and Christmas
is 'most here, and they haven't got things they really
need. Amanda's coat that she wore to meeting last
Sunday didn't look very warm to me, and poor
Alma had her furs chewed up by the Leach dog, and
she's going without any. They need lots of things.
And poor Mis' Adkins is 'most sick with tobacco
smoke. I can see it, though she doesn't say anything,
and the nice parlor curtains are full of it, and cat
hairs are all over things. I can't hold out any longer,
Edward. Maybe I am a door-mat; and if I am, and
it is wicked, may the Lord forgive me, for I've got
to keep right on being a door-mat."

Hayward sighed and lighted his pipe. However,
he had given up and connived with Jim.

On Christmas eve the two men were in hiding
behind a clump of cedars in the front yard of Jim's
nieces' house. They watched the expressman deliver
a great load of boxes and packages. Jim drew a
breath of joyous relief.

"They are taking them in," he whispered -- "they
are taking them in, Edward!"

Hayward looked down at the dim face of the man
beside him, and something akin to fear entered his
heart. He saw the face of a lifelong friend, but he
saw something in it which he had never recog-
nized before. He saw the face of one of the children
of heaven, giving only for the sake of the need of
others, and glorifying the gifts with the love and
pity of an angel.

"I was afraid they wouldn't take them!" whis-
pered Jim, and his watching face was beautiful,
although it was only the face of a little, old man of
a little village, with no great gift of intellect. There
was a full moon riding high; the ground was covered
with a glistening snow-level, over which wavered
wonderful shadows, as of wings. One great star pre-
vailed despite the silver might of the moon. To
Hayward Jim's face seemed to prevail, as that star,
among all the faces of humanity.

Jim crept noiselessly toward a window, Hayward
at his heels. The two could see the lighted interior
plainly.

"See poor Alma trying on her furs," whispered
Jim, in a rapture. "See Amanda with her coat.
They have found the money. See Joe heft the tur-
key." Suddenly he caught Hayward's arm, and
the two crept away. Out on the road, Jim fairly
sobbed with pure delight. "Oh, Edward," he said,"I
am so thankful they took the things! I was so afraid
they wouldn't, and they needed them! Oh, Edward,
I am so thankful!" Edward pressed his friend's arm.

When they reached Jim's house a great tiger-cat
leaped to Jim's shoulder with the silence and swift-
ness of a shadow. "He's always watching for me,"
said Jim, proudly. "Pussy! Pussy!" The cat be-
gan to purr loudly, and rubbed his splendid head
against the man's cheek.

"I suppose," said Hayward, with something of
awe in his tone, "that you won't smoke in the parlor
to-night?"

"Edward, I really can't. Poor woman, she's got
it all aired and beautifully cleaned, and she's so
happy over it. There's a good fire in the shed, and
I will sit there with the pussy-cats until I go to bed.
Oh, Edward, I am so thankful that they took the
things!"

"Good night, Jim."

"Good night. You don't blame me, Edward?"

"Who am I to blame you, Jim? Good night."

Hayward watched the little man pass along the
path to the shed door. Jim's back was slightly
bent, but to his friend it seemed bent beneath a
holy burden of love and pity for all humanity, and
the inheritance of the meek seemed to crown that
drooping old head. The door-mat, again spread
freely for the trampling feet of all who got comfort
thereby, became a blessed thing.  The humble
creature, despised and held in contempt like One
greater than he, giving for the sake of the needs
of others, went along the narrow foot-path through
the snow. The minister took off his hat and stood
watching until the door was opened and closed and
the little window gleamed with golden light.





THE AMETHYST COMB





THE AMETHYST COMB

MISS JANE CAREW was at the railroad station
waiting for the New York train.   She was
about to visit her friend, Mrs. Viola Longstreet.
With Miss Carew was her maid, Margaret, a middle-
aged New England woman, attired in the stiffest
and most correct of maid-uniforms. She carried an
old, large sole-leather bag, and also a rather large
sole-leather jewel-case. The jewel-case, carried
openly, was rather an unusual sight at a New Eng-
land railroad station, but few knew what it was.
They concluded it to be Margaret's special hand-
bag. Margaret was a very tall, thin woman, un-
bending as to carriage and expression. The one
thing out of absolute plumb about Margaret was
her little black bonnet. That was askew. Time
had bereft the woman of so much hair that she could
fasten no head-gear with security, especially when
the wind blew, and that morning there was a stiff
gale. Margaret's bonnet was cocked over one eye.
Miss Carew noticed it.

"Margaret, your bonnet is crooked," she said.

Margaret straightened her bonnet, but immedi-
ately the bonnet veered again to the side, weighted
by a stiff jet aigrette. Miss Carew observed the
careen of the bonnet, realized that it was inevitable,
and did not mention it again. Inwardly she resolved
upon the removal of the jet aigrette later on. Miss
Carew was slightly older than Margaret, and dressed
in a style somewhat beyond her age. Jane Carew
had been alert upon the situation of departing youth.
She had eschewed gay colors and extreme cuts, and
had her bonnets made to order, because there were
no longer anything but hats in the millinery shop.
The milliner in Wheaton, where Miss Carew lived,
had objected, for Jane Carew inspired reverence.

"A bonnet is too old for you. Miss Carew," she
said. "Women much older than you wear hats."

"I trust that I know what is becoming to a woman
of my years, thank you. Miss Waters," Jane had
replied, and the milliner had meekly taken her order.

After Miss Carew had left, the milliner told her
girls that she had never seen a woman so perfectly
crazy to look her age as Miss Carew. "And she a
pretty woman, too," said the milliner; "as straight
as an arrer, and slim, and with all that hair, scarcely
turned at all."

Miss Carew, with all her haste to assume years,
remained a pretty woman, softly slim, with an abun-
dance of dark hair, showing little gray. Sometimes
Jane reflected, uneasily, that it ought at her time
of life to be entirely gray. She hoped nobody would
suspect her of dyeing it. She wore it parted in the
middle, folded back smoothly, and braided in a
compact mass on the top of her head. The style
of her clothes was slightly behind the fashion, just
enough to suggest conservatism and age. She car-
ried a little silver-bound bag in one nicely gloved
hand; with the other she held daintily out of the
dust of the platform her dress-skirt. A glimpse of
a silk frilled petticoat, of slender feet, and ankles
delicately slim, was visible before the onslaught of
the wind. Jane Carew made no futile effort to keep
her skirts down before the wind-gusts. She was so
much of the gentlewoman that she could be gravely
oblivious to the exposure of her ankles. She looked
as if she had never heard of ankles when her black
silk skirts lashed about them. She rose superbly
above the situation. For some abstruse reason Mar-
garet's skirts were not affected by the wind. They
might have been weighted with buckram, although
it was no longer in general use. She stood, except
for her veering bonnet, as stiffly immovable as a
wooden doll.

Miss Carew seldom left Wheaton. This visit to
New York was an innovation. Quite a crowd gath-
ered about Jane's sole-leather trunk when it was
dumped on the platform by the local expressman.
"Miss Carew is going to New York," one said to
another, with much the same tone as if he had said,
"The great elm on the common is going to move
into Dr. Jones's front yard."

When the train arrived, Miss Carew, followed by
Margaret, stepped aboard with a majestic disregard
of ankles. She sat beside a window, and Margaret
placed the bag on the floor and held the jewel-case
in her lap. The case contained the Carew jewels.
They were not especially valuable, although they
were rather numerous.  There were cameos in
brooches and heavy gold bracelets; corals which
Miss Carew had not worn since her young girlhood.
There were a set of garnets, some badly cut diamonds
in ear-rings and rings, some seed-pearl ornaments,
and a really beautiful set of amethysts. There were
a necklace, two brooches -- a bar and a circle -- ear-
rings, a ring, and a comb. Each piece was charm-
ing, set in filigree gold with seed-pearls, but perhaps
of them all the comb was the best. It was a very
large comb. There was one great amethyst in the
center of the top; on either side was an intricate
pattern of plums in small amethysts, and seed-pearl
grapes, with leaves and stems of gold. Margaret
in charge of the jewel-case was imposing. When
they arrived in New York she confronted every-
body whom she met with a stony stare, which was
almost accusative and convictive of guilt, in spite
of entire innocence on the part of the person stared
at. It was inconceivable that any mortal would
have dared lay violent hands upon that jewel-case
under that stare. It would have seemed to partake
of the nature of grand larceny from Providence.

When the two reached the up-town residence of
Viola Longstreet, Viola gave a little scream at the
sight of the case.

"My dear Jane Carew, here you are with Mar-
garet carrying that jewel-case out in plain sight.
How dare you do such a thing? I really wonder
you have not been held up a dozen times."

Miss Carew smiled her gentle but almost stern
smile -- the Carew smile, which consisted in a widen-
ing and slightly upward curving of tightly closed lips.

"I do not think," said she, "that anybody would
be apt to interfere with Margaret."

Viola Longstreet laughed, the ringing peal of a
child, although she was as old as Miss Carew. "I
think you are right, Jane," said she. "I don't be-
lieve a crook in New York would dare face that
maid of yours. He would as soon encounter Ply-
mouth Rock. I am glad you have brought your de-
lightful old jewels, although you never wear any-
thing except those lovely old pearl sprays and dull
diamonds."

"Now," stated Jane, with a little toss of pride,
"I have Aunt Felicia's amethysts."

"Oh, sure enough! I remember you did write
me last summer that she had died and you had the
amethysts at last. She must have been very old."

"Ninety-one."

"She might have given you the amethysts before.
You, of course, will wear them; and I -- am going
to borrow the corals!"

Jane Carew gasped.

"You do not object, do you, dear? I have a new
dinner-gown which clamors for corals, and my bank-
account is strained, and I could buy none equal to
those of yours, anyway."

"Oh, I do not object," said Jane Carew; still she
looked aghast.

Viola Longstreet shrieked with laughter. "Oh,
I know. You think the corals too young for me.
You have not worn them since you left off dotted
muslin. My dear, you insisted upon growing old
-- I insisted upon remaining young. I had two
new dotted muslins last summer. As for corals, I
would wear them in the face of an opposing army!
Do not judge me by yourself, dear. You laid hold
of Age and held him, although you had your com-
plexion and your shape and hair. As for me, I had
my complexion and kept it. I also had my hair
and kept it. My shape has been a struggle, but it
was worth while. I, my dear, have held Youth so
tight that he has almost choked to death, but held
him I have. You cannot deny it. Look at me,
Jane Carew, and tell me if, judging by my looks,
you can reasonably state that I have no longer the
right to wear corals."

Jane Carew looked. She smiled the Carew smile.
"You DO look very young, Viola," said Jane, "but
you are not."

"Jane Carew," said Viola, "I am young. May
I wear your corals at my dinner to-morrow night?"

"Why, of course, if you think --"

"If I think them suitable. My dear, if there
were on this earth ornaments more suitable to ex-
treme youth than corals, I would borrow them if you
owned them, but, failing that, the corals will answer.
Wait until you see me in that taupe dinner-gown
and the corals!"

Jane waited. She visited with Viola, whom she
loved, although they had little in common, partly
because of leading widely different lives, partly be-
cause of constitutional variations. She was dressed
for dinner fully an hour before it was necessary,
and she sat in the library reading when Viola
swept in.

Viola was really entrancing. It was a pity that
Jane Carew had such an unswerving eye for the
essential truth that it could not be appeased by
actual effect. Viola had doubtless, as she had said,
struggled to keep her slim shape, but she had kept
it, and, what was more, kept it without evidence
of struggle. If she was in the least hampered by
tight lacing and length of undergarment, she gave
no evidence of it as she curled herself up in a big
chair and (Jane wondered how she could bring her-
self to do it) crossed her legs, revealing one delicate
foot and ankle, silk-stockinged with taupe, and shod
with a coral satin slipper with a silver heel and a
great silver buckle. On Viola's fair round neck the
Carew corals lay bloomingly; her beautiful arms
were clasped with them; a great coral brooch with
wonderful carving confined a graceful fold of the
taupe over one hip, a coral comb surmounted the
shining waves of Viola's hair. Viola was an ash-
blonde, her complexion was as roses, and the corals
were ideal for her. As Jane regarded her friend's
beauty, however, the fact that Viola was not young,
that she was as old as herself, hid it and overshad-
owed it.

"Well, Jane, don't you think I look well in the
corals, after all?" asked Viola, and there was some-
thing pitiful in her voice.

When a man or a woman holds fast to youth, even
if successfully, there is something of the pitiful and
the tragic involved. It is the everlasting struggle
of the soul to retain the joy of earth, whose fleeting
distinguishes it from heaven, and whose retention
is not accomplished without an inner knowledge of
its futility.

"I suppose you do, Viola," replied Jane Carew,
with the inflexibility of fate, "but I really think
that only very young girls ought to wear corals."

Viola laughed, but the laugh had a minor cadence.
"But I AM a young girl, Jane," she said. "I MUST
be a young girl. I never had any girlhood when I
should have had. You know that."

Viola had married, when very young, a man old
enough to be her father, and her wedded life had been
a sad affair, to which, however, she seldom alluded.
Viola had much pride with regard to the inevitable
past.

"Yes," agreed Jane. Then she added, feeling
that more might be expected, "Of course I suppose
that marrying so very young does make a difference."

"Yes," said Viola, "it does. In fact, it makes of
one's girlhood an anti-climax, of which many dis-
pute the wisdom, as you do. But have it I will. Jane,
your amethysts are beautiful."

Jane regarded the clear purple gleam of a stone
on her arm. "Yes," she agreed, "Aunt Felicia's ame-
thysts have always been considered very beautiful."

"And such a full set," said Viola.

"Yes," said Jane. She colored a little, but Viola
did not know why. At the last moment Jane had
decided not to wear the amethyst comb, because it
seemed to her altogether too decorative for a woman
of her age, and she was afraid to mention it to Viola.
She was sure that Viola would laugh at her and in-
sist upon her wearing it.

"The ear-rings are lovely," said Viola. "My dear,
I don't see how you ever consented to have your
ears pierced."

"I was very young, and my mother wished me
to," replied Jane, blushing.

The door-bell rang. Viola had been covertly lis-
tening for it all the time. Soon a very beautiful
young man came with a curious dancing step into
the room. Harold Lind always gave the effect of
dancing when he walked. He always, moreover,
gave the effect of extreme youth and of the utmost
joy and mirth in life itself. He regarded everything
and everybody with a smile as of humorous appre-
ciation, and yet the appreciation was so good-
natured that it offended nobody.

"Look at me -- I am absurd and happy; look at
yourself, also absurd and happy; look at every-
body else likewise; look at life -- a jest so delicious
that it is quite worth one's while dying to be made
acquainted with it." That is what Harold Lind
seemed to say. Viola Longstreet became even more
youthful under his gaze; even Jane Carew regretted
that she had not worn her amethyst comb and be-
gan to doubt its unsuitability. Viola very soon
called the young man's attention to Jane's ame-
thysts, and Jane always wondered why she did not
then mention the comb. She removed a brooch and
a bracelet for him to inspect.

"They are really wonderful," he declared. "I
have never seen greater depth of color in amethysts."

"Mr. Lind is an authority on jewels," declared
Viola. The young man shot a curious glance at her,
which Jane remembered long afterward. It was one
of those glances which are as keystones to situations.

Harold looked at the purple stones with the ex-
pression of a child with a toy. There was much of
the child in the young man's whole appearance,
but of a mischievous and beautiful child, of whom
his mother might observe, with adoration and ill-
concealed boastfulness, "I can never tell what that
child will do next!"

Harold returned the bracelet and brooch to Jane,
and smiled at her as if amethysts were a lovely
purple joke between her and himself, uniting them
by a peculiar bond of fine understanding. "Exqui-
site, Miss Carew," he said. Then he looked at Viola.
"Those corals suit you wonderfully, Mrs. Long-
street," he observed, "but amethysts would also
suit you."

"Not with this gown," replied Viola, rather piti-
fully. There was something in the young man's
gaze and tone which she did not understand, but
which she vaguely quivered before.

Harold certainly thought the corals were too young
for Viola. Jane understood, and felt an unworthy
triumph. Harold, who was young enough in actual
years to be Viola's son, and was younger still by
reason of his disposition, was amused by the sight
of her in corals, although he did not intend to be-
tray his amusement. He considered Viola in corals
as too rude a jest to share with her. Had poor Viola
once grasped Harold Lind's estimation of her she
would have as soon gazed upon herself in her cof-
fin. Harold's comprehension of the essentials was
beyond Jane Carew's. It was fairly ghastly, par-
taking of the nature of X-rays, but it never disturbed
Harold Lind. He went along his dance-track undis-
turbed, his blue eyes never losing their high lights
of glee, his lips never losing their inscrutable smile
at some happy understanding between life and him-
self. Harold had fair hair, which was very smooth
and glossy. His skin was like a girl's. He was so
beautiful that he showed cleverness in an affecta-
tion of carelessness in dress. He did not like to wear
evening clothes, because they had necessarily to
be immaculate. That evening Jane regarded him
with an inward criticism that he was too handsome
for a man. She told Viola so when the dinner was
over and he and the other guests had gone.

"He is very handsome," she said, "but I never
like to see a man quite so handsome."

"You will change your mind when you see him
in tweeds," returned Viola. "He loathes evening
clothes."

Jane regarded her anxiously. There was some-
thing in Viola's tone which disturbed and shocked
her. It was inconceivable that Viola should be in
love with that youth, and yet -- "He looks very
young," said Jane in a prim voice.

"He IS young," admitted Viola; "still, not quite
so young as he looks. Sometimes I tell him he will
look like a boy if he lives to be eighty."

"Well, he must be very young," persisted Jane.

"Yes," said Viola, but she did not say how young.
Viola herself, now that the excitement was over,
did not look so young as at the beginning of the
evening. She removed the corals, and Jane con-
sidered that she looked much better without
them.

"Thank you for your corals, dear," said Viola.
"Where Is Margaret?"

Margaret answered for herself by a tap on the
door. She and Viola's maid, Louisa, had been sit-
ting on an upper landing, out of sight, watching the
guests down-stairs. Margaret took the corals and
placed them in their nest in the jewel-case, also the
amethysts, after Viola had gone. The jewel-case
was a curious old affair with many compartments.
The amethysts required two. The comb was so
large that it had one for itself. That was the reason
why Margaret did not discover that evening that it
was gone. Nobody discovered it for three days,
when Viola had a little card-party. There was a
whist-table for Jane, who had never given up the
reserved and stately game. There were six tables
in Viola's pretty living-room, with a little conserva-
tory at one end and a leaping hearth fire at the other.
Jane's partner was a stout old gentleman whose wife
was shrieking with merriment at an auction-bridge
table. The other whist-players were a stupid, very
small young man who was aimlessly willing to play
anything, and an amiable young woman who be-
lieved in self-denial. Jane played conscientiously.
She returned trump leads, and played second hand
low, and third high, and it was not until the third
rubber was over that she saw. It had been in full
evidence from the first. Jane would have seen it
before the guests arrived, but Viola had not put it
in her hair until the last moment. Viola was wild
with delight, yet shamefaced and a trifle uneasy.
In a soft, white gown, with violets at her waist, she
was playing with Harold Lind, and in her ash-blond
hair was Jane Carew's amethyst comb. Jane gasped
and paled. The amiable young woman who was her
opponent stared at her. Finally she spoke in a low
voice.

"Aren't you well. Miss Carew?" she asked.

The men, in their turn, stared. The stout one
rose fussily. "Let me get a glass of water," he said.
The stupid small man stood up and waved his hands
with nervousness.

"Aren't you well?" asked the amiable young lady
again.

Then Jane Carew recovered her poise. It was
seldom that she lost it. "I am quite well, thank you,
Miss Murdock," she replied. "I believe diamonds
are trumps."

They all settled again to the play, but the young
lady and the two men continued glancing at Miss
Carew. She had recovered her dignity of manner,
but not her color. Moreover, she had a bewildered
expression. Resolutely she abstained from glancing
again at her amethyst comb in Viola Longstreet's
ash-blond hair, and gradually, by a course of sub-
conscious reasoning as she carefully played her cards,
she arrived at a conclusion which caused her color
to return and the bewildered expression to disappear.
When refreshments were served, the amiable young
lady said, kindly:

"You look quite yourself, now, dear Miss Carew,
but at one time while we were playing I was really
alarmed. You were very pale."

"I did not feel in the least ill," replied Jane
Carew. She smiled her Carew smile at the young
lady. Jane had settled it with herself that of course
Viola had borrowed that amethyst comb, appealing
to Margaret. Viola ought not to have done that;
she should have asked her, Miss Carew; and Jane
wondered, because Viola was very well bred; but
of course that was what had happened. Jane had
come down before Viola, leaving Margaret in her
room, and Viola had asked her. Jane did not then
remember that Viola had not even been told that
there was an amethyst comb in existence. She
remembered when Margaret, whose face was as
pale and bewildered as her own, mentioned it, when
she was brushing her hair.

"I saw it, first thing. Miss Jane," said Margaret.
"Louisa and I were on the landing, and I looked
down and saw your amethyst comb in Mrs. Long-
street's hair."

"She had asked you for it, because I had gone
down-stairs?" asked Jane, feebly.

"No, Miss Jane. I had not seen her. I went
out right after you did. Louisa had finished Mrs.
Longstreet, and she and I went down to the mail-
box to post a letter, and then we sat on the landing,
and -- I saw your comb."

"Have you," asked Jane, "looked in the jewel-
case?"

"Yes, Miss Jane."

"And it is not there?"

"It is not there. Miss Jane." Margaret spoke with
a sort of solemn intoning. She recognized what the
situation implied, and she, who fitted squarely and
entirely into her humble state, was aghast before
a hitherto unimagined occurrence. She could not,
even with the evidence of her senses against a lady
and her mistress's old friend, believe in them. Had
Jane told her firmly that she had not seen that
comb in that ash-blond hair she might have been
hypnotized into agreement. But Jane simply stared
at her, and the Carew dignity was more shaken than
she had ever seen it.

"Bring the jewel-case here, Margaret," ordered
Jane in a gasp.

Margaret brought the jewel-case, and everything
was taken out; all the compartments were opened,
but the amethyst comb was not there. Jane could
not sleep that night. At dawn she herself doubted
the evidence of her senses. The jewel-case was thor-
oughly overlooked again, and still Jane was incredu-
lous that she would ever see her comb in Viola's
hair again. But that evening, although there were
no guests except Harold Lind, who dined at the
house, Viola appeared in a pink-tinted gown, with a
knot of violets at her waist, and -- she wore the ame-
thyst comb. She said not one word concerning it;
nobody did. Harold Lind was in wild spirits. The
conviction grew upon Jane that the irresponsible,
beautiful youth was covertly amusing himself at her,
at Viola's, at everybody's expense.  Perhaps he
included himself.  He talked incessantly, not in
reality brilliantly, but with an effect of sparkling
effervescence which was fairly dazzling.  Viola's
servants restrained with difficulty their laughter at
his sallies. Viola regarded Harold with ill-concealed
tenderness and admiration. She herself looked even
younger than usual, as if the innate youth in her
leaped to meet this charming comrade.

Jane felt sickened by it all. She could not under-
stand her friend. Not for one minute did she dream
that there could be any serious outcome of the
situation; that Viola, would marry this mad youth,
who, she knew, was making such covert fun at her
expense; but she was bewildered and indignant.
She wished that she had not come. That evening
when she went to her room she directed Margaret
to pack, as she intended to return home the next
day. Margaret began folding gowns with alacrity.
She was as conservative as her mistress and she
severely disapproved of many things. However, the
matter of the amethyst comb was uppermost in her
mind. She was wild with curiosity. She hardly
dared inquire, but finally she did.

"About the amethyst comb, ma'am?" she said,
with a delicate cough.

"What about it, Margaret?" returned Jane,
severely.

"I thought perhaps Mrs. Longstreet had told you
how she happened to have it."

Poor Jane Carew had nobody in whom to confide.
For once she spoke her mind to her maid. "She
has not said one word. And, oh, Margaret, I don't
know what to think of it."

Margaret pursed her lips.

"What do YOU think, Margaret?"

"I don't know. Miss Jane."

"I don't."

"I did not mention it to Louisa," said Margaret.

"Oh, I hope not!" cried Jane.

"But she did to me," said Margaret. "She asked
had I seen Miss Viola's new comb, and then she
laughed, and I thought from the way she acted
that --" Margaret hesitated.

"That what?"

"That she meant Mr. Lind had given Miss Viola
the comb."

Jane started violently. "Absolutely impossible!"
she cried. "That, of course, is nonsense. There
must be some explanation. Probably Mrs. Long-
street will explain before we go."

Mrs. Longstreet did not explain. She wondered
and expostulated when Jane announced her firm
determination to leave, but she seemed utterly at
a loss for the reason. She did not mention the comb.

When Jane Carew took leave of her old friend she
was entirely sure in her own mind that she would
never visit her again -- might never even see her
again.

Jane was unutterably thankful to be back in her
own peaceful home, over which no shadow of absurd
mystery brooded; only a calm afternoon light of
life, which disclosed gently but did not conceal or
betray. Jane settled back into her pleasant life,
and the days passed, and the weeks, and the months,
and the years. She heard nothing whatever from
or about Viola Longstreet for three years. Then, one
day, Margaret returned from the city, and she had
met Viola's old maid Louisa in a department store,
and she had news. Jane wished for strength to
refuse to listen, but she could not muster it. She
listened while Margaret brushed her hair.

"Louisa has not been with Miss Viola for a long
time," said Margaret. "She is living with some-
body else. Miss Viola lost her money, and had to
give up her house and her servants, and Louisa said
she cried when she said good-by."

Jane made an effort. "What became of --" she
began.

Margaret answered the unfinished sentence. She
was excited by gossip as by a stimulant. Her thin
cheeks burned, her eyes blazed. "Mr. Lind," said
Margaret, "Louisa told me, had turned out to be
real bad. He got into some money trouble, and
then" -- Margaret lowered her voice -- "he was ar-
rested for taking a lot of money which didn't belong
to him. Louisa said he had been in some business
where he handled a lot of other folks' money, and
he cheated the men who were in the business with
him, and he was tried, and Miss Viola, Louisa thinks,
hid away somewhere so they wouldn't call her to
testify, and then he had to go to prison; but --"
Margaret hesitated.

"What is it?" asked Jane.

"Louisa thinks he died about a year and a half
ago. She heard the lady where she lives now talking
about it. The lady used to know Miss Viola, and
she heard the lady say Mr. Lind had died in prison,
that he couldn't stand the hard life, and that Miss
Viola had lost all her money through him, and then"
-- Margaret hesitated again, and her mistress prodded
sharply -- "Louisa said that she heard the lady say
that she had thought Miss Viola would marry him,
but she hadn't, and she had more sense than she
had thought."

"Mrs. Longstreet would never for one moment
have entertained the thought of marrying Mr. Lind;
he was young enough to be her grandson," said
Jane, severely.

"Yes, ma'am," said Margaret.

It so happened that Jane went to New York
that day week, and at a jewelry counter in one of
the shops she discovered the amethyst comb. There
were on sale a number of bits of antique jewelry,
the precious flotsam and jetsam of old and wealthy
families which had drifted, nobody knew before
what currents of adversity, into that harbor of
sale for all the world to see. Jane made no inquiries;
the saleswoman volunteered simply the information
that the comb was a real antique, and the stones
were real amethysts and pearls, and the setting was
solid gold, and the price was thirty dollars; and
Jane bought it. She carried her old amethyst comb
home, but she did not show it to anybody. She
replaced it in its old compartment in her jewel-
case and thought of it with wonder, with a hint of
joy at regaining it, and with much sadness. She
was still fond of Viola Longstreet. Jane did not
easily part with her loves. She did not know where
Viola was. Margaret had inquired of Louisa, who
did not know. Poor Viola had probably drifted
into some obscure harbor of life wherein she was
hiding until life was over.

And then Jane met Viola one spring day on Fifth
Avenue.

"It is a very long time since I have seen you,"
said Jane with a reproachful accent, but her eyes
were tenderly inquiring.

"Yes," agreed Viola. Then she added, "I have
seen nobody. Do you know what a change has come
in my life?" she asked.

"Yes, dear," replied Jane, gently. "My Margaret
met Louisa once and she told her."

"Oh yes -- Louisa," said Viola. "I had to dis-
charge her. My money is about gone. I have only
just enough to keep the wolf from entering the door
of a hall bedroom in a respectable boarding-house.
However, I often hear him howl, but I do not mind
at all. In fact, the howling has become company
for me. I rather like it. It is queer what things one
can learn to like. There are a few left yet, like the
awful heat in summer, and the food, which I do not
fancy, but that is simply a matter of time."

Viola's laugh was like a bird's song -- a part of her
-- and nothing except death could silence it for long.

"Then," said Jane, "you stay in New York all
summer?"

Viola laughed again. "My dear," she replied,
"of course. It is all very simple. If I left New
York, and paid board anywhere, I would never have
enough money to buy my return fare, and certainly
not to keep that wolf from my hall-bedroom door."

"Then," said Jane, "you are going home with me."

"I cannot consent to accept charity, Jane," said
Viola. "Don't ask me."

Then, for the first time in her life, Viola Longstreet
saw Jane Carew's eyes blaze with anger. "You
dare to call it charity coming from me to you?"
she said, and Viola gave in.

When Jane saw the little room where Viola lived,
she marveled, with the exceedingly great marveling
of a woman to whom love of a man has never come,
at a woman who could give so much and with no
return.

Little enough to pack had Viola. Jane under-
stood with a shudder of horror that it was almost
destitution, not poverty, to which her old friend was
reduced.

"You shall have that northeast room which you
always liked," she told Viola when they were on
the train.

"The one with the old-fashioned peacock paper,
and the pine-tree growing close to one window?"
said Viola, happily.

Jane and Viola settled down to life together,
and Viola, despite the tragedy which she had known,
realized a peace and happiness beyond her imagina-
tion. In reality, although she still looked so youth-
ful, she was old enough to enjoy the pleasures of later
life. Enjoy them she did to the utmost. She and
Jane made calls together, entertained friends at
small and stately dinners, and gave little teas. They
drove about in the old Carew carriage. Viola had
some new clothes. She played very well on Jane's
old piano. She embroidered, she gardened. She
lived the sweet, placid life of an older lady in a little
village, and loved it. She never mentioned Harold
Lind.

Not among the vicious of the earth was poor Har-
old Lind; rather among those of such beauty and
charm that the earth spoils them, making them, in
their own estimation, free guests at all its tables
of bounty. Moreover, the young man had, deeply
rooted in his character, the traits of a mischievous
child, rejoicing in his mischief more from a sense of
humor so keen that it verged on cruelty than from
any intention to harm others. Over that affair of
the amethyst comb, for instance, his irresponsible,
selfish, childish soul had fairly reveled in glee. He
had not been fond of Viola, but he liked her fondness
for himself. He had made sport of her, but only
for his own entertainment -- never for the entertain-
ment of others. He was a beautiful creature, seeking
out paths of pleasure and folly for himself alone,
which ended as do all paths of earthly pleasure and
folly. Harold had admired Viola, but from the same
point of view as Jane Carew's. Viola had, when she
looked her youngest and best, always seemed so
old as to be venerable to him. He had at times
compunctions, as if he were making a jest of his
grandmother. Viola never knew the truth about the
amethyst comb. He had considered that one of the
best frolics of his life. He had simply purloined it
and presented it to Viola, and merrily left matters
to settle themselves.

Viola and Jane had lived together a month before
the comb was mentioned. Then one day Viola was
in Jane's room and the jewel-case was out, and she
began examining its contents. When she found the
amethyst comb she gave a little cry. Jane, who had
been seated at her desk and had not seen what was
going on, turned around.

Viola stood holding the comb, and her cheeks
were burning. She fondled the trinket as if it had
been a baby. Jane watched her. She began to
understand the bare facts of the mystery of the dis-
appearance of her amethyst comb, but the subtlety
of it was forever beyond her. Had the other woman
explained what was in her mind, in her heart -- how
that reckless young man whom she had loved had
given her the treasure because he had heard her
admire Jane's amethysts, and she, all unconscious
of any wrong-doing, had ever regarded it as the one
evidence of his thoughtful tenderness, it being the
one gift she had ever received from him; how she
parted with it, as she had parted with her other
jewels, in order to obtain money to purchase com-
forts for him while he was in prison -- Jane could
not have understood. The fact of an older woman
being fond of a young man, almost a boy, was be-
yond her mental grasp. She had no imagination
with which to comprehend that innocent, pathetic,
almost terrible love of one who has trodden the
earth long for one who has just set dancing feet
upon it. It was noble of Jane Carew that, lacking
all such imagination, she acted as she did: that, al-
though she did not, could not, formulate it to herself,
she would no more have deprived the other woman
and the dead man of that one little unscathed bond
of tender goodness than she would have robbed
his grave of flowers.

Viola looked at her. "I cannot tell you all about
it; you would laugh at me," she whispered; "but
this was mine once."

"It is yours now, dear," said Jane.




THE UMBRELLA MAN





THE UMBRELLA MAN

IT was an insolent day. There are days which,
to imaginative minds, at least, possess strangely
human qualities. Their atmospheres predispose peo-
ple to crime or virtue, to the calm of good will, to
sneaking vice, or fierce, unprovoked aggression. The
day was of the last description. A beast, or a human
being in whose veins coursed undisciplined blood,
might, as involuntarily as the boughs of trees lash
before storms, perform wild and wicked deeds after
inhaling that hot air, evil with the sweat of sin-
evoked toil, with nitrogen stored from festering sores
of nature and the loathsome emanations of suffering
life.

It had not rained for weeks, but the humidity was
great. The clouds of dust which arose beneath the
man's feet had a horrible damp stickiness. His face
and hands were grimy, as were his shoes, his cheap,
ready-made suit, and his straw hat. However, the
man felt a pride in his clothes, for they were at least
the garb of freedom. He had come out of prison the
day before, and had scorned the suit proffered him
by the officials. He had given it away, and bought
a new one with a goodly part of his small stock of
money. This suit was of a small-checked pattern.
Nobody could tell from it that the wearer had just
left jail. He had been there for several years for
one of the minor offenses against the law. His term
would probably have been shorter, but the judge
had been careless, and he had no friends. Stebbins
had never been the sort to make many friends,
although he had never cherished animosity toward
any human being. Even some injustice in his sen-
tence had not caused him to feel any rancor.

During his stay in the prison he had not been
really unhappy. He had accepted the inevitable --
the yoke of the strong for the weak -- with a patience
which brought almost a sense of enjoyment. But,
now that he was free, he had suddenly become alert,
watchful of chances for his betterment. From being
a mere kenneled creature he had become as a
hound on the scent, the keenest on earth -- that of
self-interest. He was changed, while yet living, from
a being outside the world to one with the world
before him. He felt young, although he was a
middle-aged, almost elderly man. He had in his
pocket only a few dollars. He might have had more
had he not purchased the checked suit and had he
not given much away. There was another man whose
term would be up in a week, and he had a sickly
wife and several children. Stebbins, partly from
native kindness and generosity, partly from a senti-
ment which almost amounted to superstition, had
given him of his slender store. He had been de-
prived of his freedom because of money; he said to
himself that his return to it should be heralded by the
music of it scattered abroad for the good of another.

Now and then as he walked Stebbins removed his
new straw hat, wiped his forehead with a stiff new
handkerchief, looked with some concern at the grime
left upon it, then felt anxiously of his short crop
of grizzled hair. He would be glad when it grew
only a little, for it was at present a telltale to obser-
vant eyes. Also now and then he took from another
pocket a small mirror which he had just purchased,
and scrutinized his face. Every time he did so he
rubbed his cheeks violently, then viewed with satis-
faction the hard glow which replaced the yellow
prison pallor. Every now and then, too, he remem-
bered to throw his shoulders back, hold his chin
high, and swing out his right leg more freely. At
such times he almost swaggered, he became fairly
insolent with his new sense of freedom. He felt
himself the equal if not the peer of all creation.
Whenever a carriage or a motor-car passed him on the
country road he assumed, with the skill of an actor,
the air of a business man hastening to an important
engagement. However, always his mind was work-
ing over a hard problem. He knew that his store of
money was scanty, that it would not last long even
with the strictest economy; he had no friends; a
prison record is sure to leak out when a man seeks
a job. He was facing the problem of bare existence.

Although the day was so hot, it was late summer;
soon would come the frost and the winter. He wished
to live to enjoy his freedom, and all he had for assets
was that freedom; which was paradoxical, for it
did not signify the ability to obtain work, which
was the power of life. Outside the stone wall of the
prison he was now inclosed by a subtle, intangible,
yet infinitely more unyielding one -- the prejudice
of his kind against the released prisoner. He was
to all intents and purposes a prisoner still, for all his
spurts of swagger and the youthful leap of his pulses,
and while he did not admit that to himself, yet
always, since he had the hard sense of the land of
his birth -- New England -- he pondered that problem
of existence. He felt instinctively that it would be
a useless proceeding for him to approach any human
being for employment. He knew that even the
freedom, which he realized through all his senses
like an essential perfume, could not yet overpower
the reek of the prison. As he walked through the
clogging dust he thought of one after another whom
he had known before he had gone out of the world
of free men and had bent his back under the hand of
the law. There were, of course, people in his little
native village, people who had been friends and
neighbors, but there were none who had ever loved
him sufficiently for him to conquer his resolve to
never ask aid of them. He had no relatives except
cousins more or less removed, and they would have
nothing to do with him.

There had been a woman whom he had meant to
marry, and he had been sure that she would marry
him; but after he had been a year in prison the
news had come to him in a roundabout fashion that
she had married another suitor. Even had she re-
mained single he could not have approached her,
least of all for aid. Then, too, through all his term
she had made no sign, there had been no letter, no
message; and he had received at first letters and
flowers and messages from sentimental women.
There had been nothing from her. He had accepted
nothing, with the curious patience, carrying an odd
pleasure with it, which had come to him when the
prison door first closed upon him. He had not for-
gotten her, but he had not consciously mourned
her. His loss, his ruin, had been so tremendous that
she had been swallowed up in it. When one's
whole system needs to be steeled to trouble and pain,
single pricks lose importance. He thought of her
that day without any sense of sadness. He imagined
her in a pretty, well-ordered home with her husband
and children. Perhaps she had grown stout. She
had been a slender woman. He tried idly to imagine
how she would look stout, then by the sequence of
self-preservation the imagination of stoutness in an-
other led to the problem of keeping the covering
of flesh and fatness upon his own bones. The ques-
tion now was not of the woman; she had passed
out of his life. The question was of the keeping that
life itself, the life which involved everything else,
in a hard world, which would remorselessly as a steel
trap grudge him life and snap upon him, now he was
become its prey.

He walked and walked, and it was high noon, and
he was hungry. He had in his pocket a small loaf
of bread and two frankfurters, and he heard the
splashing ripple of a brook. At that juncture the
road was bordered by thick woodland. He followed,
pushing his way through the trees and undergrowth,
the sound of the brook, and sat down in a cool,
green solitude with a sigh of relief. He bent over
the clear run, made a cup of his hand, and drank,
then he fell to eating. Close beside him grew some
wintergreen, and when he had finished his bread and
frankfurters he began plucking the glossy, aromatic
leaves and chewing them automatically. The savor
reached his palate, and his memory awakened before
it as before a pleasant tingling of a spur. As a boy
how he had loved this little green low-growing plant!
It had been one of the luxuries of his youth. Now,
as he tasted it, joy and pathos stirred in his very
soul. What a wonder youth had been, what a
splendor, what an immensity to be rejoiced over
and regretted! The man lounging beside the brook,
chewing wintergreen leaves, seemed to realize anti-
podes. He lived for the moment in the past, and
the immutable future, which might contain the past
in the revolution of time. He smiled, and his face
fell into boyish, almost childish, contours.   He
plucked another glossy leaf with his hard, veinous
old hands. His hands would not change to suit his
mood, but his limbs relaxed like those of a boy. He
stared at the brook gurgling past in brown ripples,
shot with dim prismatic lights, showing here clear
green water lines, here inky depths, and he thought
of the possibility of trout. He wished for fishing-
tackle.

Then suddenly out of a mass of green looked two
girls, with wide, startled eyes, and rounded mouths
of terror which gave vent to screams. There was a
scuttling, then silence. The man wondered why
the girls were so silly, why they ran. He did not
dream of the possibility of their terror of him. He
ate another wintergreen leaf, and thought of the
woman he had expected to marry when he was ar-
rested and imprisoned. She did not go back to his
childish memories. He had met her when first youth
had passed, and yet, somehow, the savor of the
wintergreen leaves brought her face before him. It
is strange how the excitement of one sense will some-
times act as stimulant for the awakening of another.
Now the sense of taste brought into full activity
that of sight. He saw the woman just as she had
looked when he had last seen her. She had not been
pretty, but she was exceedingly dainty, and pos-
sessed of a certain elegance of carriage which at-
tracted. He saw quite distinctly her small, irregu-
lar face and the satin-smooth coils of dark hair
around her head; he saw her slender, dusky hands
with the well-cared-for nails and the too prominent
veins; he saw the gleam of the diamond which he
had given her. She had sent it to him just after his
arrest, and he had returned it. He wondered idly
whether she still owned it and wore it, and what her
husband thought of it. He speculated childishly --
somehow imprisonment had encouraged the return
of childish speculations -- as to whether the woman's
husband had given her a larger and costlier diamond
than his, and he felt a pang of jealousy. He re-
fused to see another diamond than his own upon
that slender, dark hand. He saw her in a black silk
gown which had been her best. There had been
some red about it, and a glitter of jet. He had
thought it a magnificent gown, and the woman in it
like a princess. He could see her leaning back, in
her long slim grace, in a corner of a sofa, and the
soft dark folds starry with jet sweeping over her
knees and just allowing a glimpse of one little foot.
Her feet had been charming, very small and highly
arched. Then he remembered that that evening
they had been to a concert in the town hall, and
that afterward they had partaken of an oyster stew
in a little restaurant. Then back his mind traveled
to the problem of his own existence, his food and
shelter and clothes. He dismissed the woman from
his thought. He was concerned now with the primal
conditions of life itself. How was he to eat when
his little stock of money was gone? He sat staring
at the brook; he chewed wintergreen leaves no
longer. Instead he drew from his pocket an old
pipe and a paper of tobacco. He filled his pipe
with care -- tobacco was precious; then he began to
smoke, but his face now looked old and brooding
through the rank blue vapor. Winter was coming,
and he had not a shelter. He had not money enough
to keep him long from starvation. He knew not
how to obtain employment. He thought vaguely of
wood-piles, of cutting winter fuel for people. His
mind traveled in a trite strain of reasoning. Some-
how wood-piles seemed the only available tasks for
men of his sort.

Presently he finished his filled pipe, and arose
with an air of decision. He went at a brisk pace
out of the wood and was upon the road again. He
progressed like a man with definite business in view
until he reached a house. It was a large white
farm-house with many outbuildings. It looked most
promising. He approached the side door, and a
dog sprang from around a corner and barked, but
he spoke, and the dog's tail became eloquent. He
was patting the dog, when the door opened and a
man stood looking at him. Immediately the taint
of the prison became evident. He had not cringed
before the dog, but he did cringe before the man
who lived in that fine white house, and who had
never known what it was to be deprived of liberty.
He hung his head, he mumbled. The house-owner,
who was older than he, was slightly deaf. He
looked him over curtly. The end of it was he was
ordered off the premises, and went; but the dog
trailed, wagging at his heels, and had to be roughly
called back. The thought of the dog comforted
Stebbins as he went on his way. He had always
liked animals. It was something, now he was past
a hand-shake, to have the friendly wag of a dog's
tail.

The next house was an ornate little cottage with
bay-windows, through which could be seen the flower
patterns of lace draperies; the Virginia creeper
which grew over the house walls was turning crim-
son in places. Stebbins went around to the back
door and knocked, but nobody came. He waited
a long time, for he had spied a great pile of uncut
wood. Finally he slunk around to the front door.
As he went he suddenly reflected upon his state of
mind in days gone by; if he could have known that
the time would come when he, Joseph Stebbins,
would feel culpable at approaching any front door!
He touched the electric bell and stood close to the
door, so that he might not be discovered from the
windows. Presently the door opened the length
of a chain, and a fair girlish head appeared. She
was one of the girls who had been terrified by him
in the woods, but that he did not know. Now again
her eyes dilated and her pretty mouth rounded!
She gave a little cry and slammed the door in his
face, and he heard excited voices. Then he saw two
pale, pretty faces, the faces of the two girls who had
come upon him in the wood, peering at him around
a corner of the lace in the bay-window, and he under-
stood what it meant -- that he was an object of ter-
ror to them. Directly he experienced such a sense
of mortal insult as he had never known, not even
when the law had taken hold of him. He held his
head high and went away, his very soul boiling with
a sort of shamed rage. "Those two girls are afraid
of me," he kept saying to himself. His knees shook
with the horror of it. This terror of him seemed the
hardest thing to bear in a hard life. He returned
to his green nook beside the brook and sat down
again. He thought for the moment no more of wood-
piles, of his life. He thought about those two young
girls who had been afraid of him. He had never had
an impulse to harm any living thing. A curious
hatred toward these living things who had accused
him of such an impulse came over him. He laughed
sardonically.  He wished that they would again
come and peer at him through the bushes; he would
make a threatening motion for the pleasure of seeing
the silly things scuttle away.

After a while he put it all out of mind, and again
returned to his problem. He lay beside the brook
and pondered, and finally fell asleep in the hot air,
which increased in venom, until the rattle of thun-
der awoke him. It was very dark -- a strange, livid
darkness. "A thunder-storm," he muttered, and
then he thought of his new clothes -- what a mis-
fortune it would be to have them soaked. He arose
and pushed through the thicket around him into a
cart path, and it was then that he saw the thing
which proved to be the stepping-stone toward his
humble fortunes. It was only a small silk umbrella
with a handle tipped with pearl. He seized upon it
with joy, for it meant the salvation of his precious
clothes. He opened it and held it over his head,
although the rain had not yet begun. One rib of
the umbrella was broken, but it was still serviceable.
He hastened along the cart path; he did not know
why, only the need for motion, to reach protection
from the storm, was upon him; and yet what pro-
tection could be ahead of him in that woodland
path? Afterward he grew to think of it as a blind
instinct which led him on.

He had not gone far, not more than half a mile,
when he saw something unexpected -- a small un-
tenanted house. He gave vent to a little cry of joy,
which had in it something child-like and pathetic,
and pushed open the door and entered. It was
nothing but a tiny, unfinished shack, with one room
and a small one opening from it. There was no
ceiling; overhead was the tent-like slant of the
roof, but it was tight. The dusty floor was quite
dry. There was one rickety chair. Stebbins, after
looking into the other room to make sure that the
place was empty, sat down, and a wonderful wave
of content and self-respect came over him. The
poor human snail had found his shell; he had a
habitation, a roof of shelter. The little dim place
immediately assumed an aspect of home. The rain
came down in torrents, the thunder crashed, the
place was filled with blinding blue lights. Stebbins
filled his pipe more lavishly this time, tilted his
chair against the wall, smoked, and gazed about
him with pitiful content. It was really so little,
but to him it was so much. He nodded with satis-
faction at the discovery of a fireplace and a rusty
cooking-stove.

He sat and smoked until the storm passed over.
The rainfall had been very heavy, there had been
hail, but the poor little house had not failed of per-
fect shelter. A fairly cold wind from the northwest
blew through the door. The hail had brought about
a change of atmosphere. The burning heat was
gone. The night would be cool, even chilly.

Stebbins got up and examined the stove and the
pipe. They were rusty, but appeared trustworthy.
He went out and presently returned with some fuel
which he had found unwet in a thick growth of
wood. He laid a fire handily and lit it. The little
stove burned well, with no smoke. Stebbins looked
at it, and was perfectly happy. He had found other
treasures outside -- a small vegetable-garden in which
were potatoes and some corn. A man had squatted
in this little shack for years, and had raised his own
garden-truck. He had died only a few weeks ago,
and his furniture had been pre-empted with the ex-
ception of the stove, the chair, a tilting lounge in
the small room, and a few old iron pots and frying-
pans. Stebbins gathered corn, dug potatoes, and
put them on the stove to cook, then he hurried out
to the village store and bought a few slices of bacon,
half a dozen eggs, a quarter of a pound of cheap tea,
and some salt. When he re-entered the house he
looked as he had not for years. He was beaming.
"Come, this is a palace," he said to himself, and
chuckled with pure joy. He had come out of the
awful empty spaces of homeless life into home. He
was a man who had naturally strong domestic in-
stincts. If he had spent the best years of his life
in a home instead of a prison, the finest in him would
have been developed. As it was, this was not even
now too late. When he had cooked his bacon and
eggs and brewed his tea, when the vegetables were
done and he was seated upon the rickety chair, with
his supper spread before him on an old board propped
on sticks, he was supremely happy. He ate with a
relish which seemed to reach his soul. He was at
home, and eating, literally, at his own board. As
he ate he glanced from time to time at the two win-
dows, with broken panes of glass and curtainless.
He was not afraid -- that was nonsense; he had
never been a cowardly man, but he felt the need of
curtains or something before his windows to shut
out the broad vast face of nature, or perhaps prying
human eyes. Somebody might espy the light in the
house and wonder. He had a candle stuck in an old
bottle by way of illumination. Still, although he
would have preferred to have curtains before those
windows full of the blank stare of night, he WAS
supremely happy.

After he had finished his supper he looked long-
ingly at his pipe. He hesitated for a second, for he
realized the necessity of saving his precious tobacco;
then he became reckless: such enormous good for-
tune as a home must mean more to follow; it must
be the first of a series of happy things. He filled
his pipe and smoked. Then he went to bed on the
old couch in the other room, and slept like a child
until the sun shone through the trees in flickering
lines. Then he rose, went out to the brook which
ran near the house, splashed himself with water,
returned to the house, cooked the remnant of the
eggs and bacon, and ate his breakfast with the same
exultant peace with which he had eaten his supper
the night before. Then he sat down in the doorway
upon the sunken sill and fell again to considering
his main problem. He did not smoke. His tobacco
was nearly exhausted and he was no longer reckless.
His head was not turned now by the feeling that
he was at home. He considered soberly as to the
probable owner of the house and whether he would
be allowed to remain its tenant. Very soon, how-
ever, his doubt concerning that was set at rest. He
saw a disturbance of the shadows cast by the thick
boughs over the cart path by a long outreach of
darker shadow which he knew at once for that of a
man. He sat upright, and his face at first assumed
a defiant, then a pleading expression, like that of a
child who desires to retain possession of some dear
thing. His heart beat hard as he watched the ad-
vance of the shadow. It was slow, as if cast by an
old man. The man was old and very stout, sup-
porting one lopping side by a stick, who presently
followed the herald of his shadow. He looked like
a farmer. Stebbins rose as he approached; the two
men stood staring at each other.

"Who be you, neighbor?" inquired the new-
comer.

The voice essayed a roughness, but only achieved
a tentative friendliness. Stebbins hesitated for a
second; a suspicious look came into the farmer's
misty blue eyes. Then Stebbins, mindful of his
prison record and fiercely covetous of his new home,
gave another name. The name of his maternal
grandfather seemed suddenly to loom up in printed
characters before his eyes, and he gave it glibly.
"David Anderson," he said, and he did not realize
a lie. Suddenly the name seemed his own. Surely
old David Anderson, who had been a good man,
would not grudge the gift of his unstained name to
replace the stained one of his grandson. "David
Anderson," he replied, and looked the other man
in the face unflinchingly.

"Where do ye hail from?" inquired the farmer;
and the new David Anderson gave unhesitatingly
the name of the old David Anderson's birth and
life and death place -- that of a little village in New
Hampshire.

"What do you do for your living?" was the next
question, and the new David Anderson had an in-
spiration. His eyes had lit upon the umbrella which
he had found the night before.

"Umbrellas," he replied, laconically, and the
other man nodded. Men with sheaves of umbrellas,
mended or in need of mending, had always been
familiar features for him.

Then David assumed the initiative; possessed
of an honorable business as well as home, he grew
bold. "Any objection to my staying here?" he
asked.

The other man eyed him sharply.  "Smoke
much?" he inquired.

"Smoke a pipe sometimes."

"Careful with your matches?"

David nodded.

"That's all I think about," said the farmer.
"These woods is apt to catch fire jest when I'm
about ready to cut. The man that squatted here
before -- he died about a month ago -- didn't smoke.
He was careful, he was."

"I'll be real careful," said David, humbly and
anxiously.

"I dun'no' as I have any objections to your stay-
ing, then," said the farmer. "Somebody has always
squat here. A man built this shack about twenty
year ago, and he lived here till he died. Then
t'other feller he came along. Reckon he must have
had a little money; didn't work at nothin'! Raised
some garden-truck and kept a few chickens. I took
them home after he died. You can have them now
if you want to take care of them. He rigged up
that little chicken-coop back there."

"I'll take care of them," answered David, fer-
vently.

"Well, you can come over by and by and get 'em.
There's nine hens and a rooster. They lay pretty
well. I ain't no use for 'em. I've got all the hens
of my own I want to bother with."

"All right," said David. He looked blissful.

The farmer stared past him into the house. He
spied the solitary umbrella. He grew facetious.
"Guess the umbrellas was all mended up where
you come from if you've got down to one," said he.

David nodded. It was tragically true, that guess.

"Well, our umbrella got turned last week," said
the farmer. "I'll give you a job to start on. You
can stay here as long as you want if you're careful
about your matches." Again he looked into the
house. "Guess some boys have been helpin' them-
selves to the furniture, most of it," he observed.
"Guess my wife can spare ye another chair, and
there's an old table out in the corn-house better
than that one you've rigged up, and I guess she'll
give ye some old bedding so you can be comfortable.

Got any money?"

"A little."

"I don't want any pay for things, and my wife
won't; didn't mean that; was wonderin' whether
ye had anything to buy vittles with."

"Reckon I can manage till I get some work,"
replied David, a trifle stiffly. He was a man who
had never lived at another than the state's expense.

"Don't want ye to be too short, that's all," said
the other, a little apologetically.

"I shall be all right. There are corn and potatoes
in the garden, anyway."

"So there be, and one of them hens had better
be eat. She don't lay. She'll need a good deal of
b'ilin'. You can have all the wood you want to
pick up, but I don't want any cut. You mind that
or there'll be trouble."

"I won't cut a stick."

"Mind ye don't. Folks call me an easy mark,
and I guess myself I am easy up to a certain point,
and cuttin' my wood is one of them points. Roof
didn't leak in that shower last night, did it?"

"Not a bit."

"Didn't s'pose it would. The other feller was
handy, and he kept tinkerin' all the time. Well,
I'll be goin'; you can stay here and welcome if
you're careful about matches and don't cut my wood.
Come over for them hens any time you want to.
I'll let my hired man drive you back in the wagon."

"Much obliged," said David, with an inflection
that was almost tearful.

"You're welcome," said the other, and ambled
away.

The new David Anderson, the good old grand-
father revived in his unfortunate, perhaps graceless
grandson, reseated himself on the door-step and
watched the bulky, receding figure of his visitor
through a pleasant blur of tears, which made the
broad, rounded shoulders and the halting columns of
legs dance. This David Anderson had almost for-
gotten that there was unpaid kindness in the whole
world, and it seemed to him as if he had seen angels
walking up and down. He sat for a while doing
nothing except realizing happiness of the present
and of the future. He gazed at the green spread
of forest boughs, and saw in pleased anticipation
their red and gold tints of autumn; also in pleased
anticipation their snowy and icy mail of winter,
and himself, the unmailed, defenseless human crea-
ture, housed and sheltered, sitting before his
own fire. This last happy outlook aroused him.
If all this was to be, he must be up and doing.
He got up, entered the house, and examined the
broken umbrella which was his sole stock in trade.
David was a handy man. He at once knew that
he was capable of putting it in perfect repair.
Strangely enough, for his sense of right and wrong
was not blunted, he had no compunction whatever
in keeping this umbrella, although he was reasonably
certain that it belonged to one of the two young
girls who had been so terrified by him. He had a con-
viction that this monstrous terror of theirs, which
had hurt him more than many apparently crueler
things, made them quits.

After he had washed his dishes in the brook, and
left them in the sun to dry, he went to the village
store and purchased a few simple things necessary
for umbrella-mending. Both on his way to the store
and back he kept his eyes open. He realized that
his capital depended largely upon chance and good
luck.  He considered that he had extraordinary
good luck when he returned with three more umbrel-
las. He had discovered one propped against the
counter of the store, turned inside out. He had in-
quired to whom it belonged, and had been answered
to anybody who wanted it. David had seized upon
it with secret glee. Then, unheard-of good fortune,
he had found two more umbrellas on his way home;
one was in an ash-can, the other blowing along like
a belated bat beside the trolley track. It began to
seem to David as if the earth might be strewn with
abandoned umbrellas. Before he began his work
he went to the farmer's and returned in triumph,
driven in the farm-wagon, with his cackling hens
and quite a load of household furniture, besides
some bread and pies. The farmer's wife was one of
those who are able to give, and make receiving
greater than giving. She had looked at David,
who was older than she, with the eyes of a mother,
and his pride had melted away, and he had held out
his hands for her benefits, like a child who has no
compunctions about receiving gifts because he knows
that they are his right of childhood.

Henceforth David prospered -- in a humble way,
it is true, still he prospered. He journeyed about
the country, umbrellas over his shoulder, little bag
of tools in hand, and reaped an income more than
sufficient for his simple wants. His hair had grown,
and also his beard. Nobody suspected his history.
He met the young girls whom he had terrified on
the road often, and they did not know him. He
did not, during the winter, travel very far afield.
Night always found him at home, warm, well fed,
content, and at peace. Sometimes the old farmer
on whose land he lived dropped in of an evening
and they had a game of checkers. The old man was
a checker expert. He played with unusual skill,
but David made for himself a little code of honor.
He would never beat the old man, even if he were
able, oftener than once out of three evenings. He
made coffee on these convivial occasions. He made
very good coffee, and they sipped as they moved
the men and kings, and the old man chuckled, and
David beamed with peaceful happiness.

But the next spring, when he began to realize that
he had mended for a while all the umbrellas in the
vicinity and that his trade was flagging, he set his
precious little home in order, barricaded door and
windows, and set forth for farther fields. He was
lucky, as he had been from the start. He found
plenty of employment, and slept comfortably enough
in barns, and now and then in the open. He had
traveled by slow stages for several weeks before he
entered a village whose familiar look gave him a
shock. It was not his native village, but near it.
In his younger life he had often journeyed there.
It was a little shopping emporium, almost a city.
He recognized building after building. Now and
then he thought he saw a face which he had once
known, and he was thankful that there was hardly
any possibility of any one recognizing him. He had
grown gaunt and thin since those far-off days; he
wore a beard, grizzled, as was his hair. In those
days he had not been an umbrella man. Sometimes
the humor of the situation struck him. What would
he have said, he the spruce, plump, head-in-the-air
young man, if anybody had told him that it would
come to pass that he would be an umbrella man lurk-
ing humbly in search of a job around the back doors
of houses? He would laugh softly to himself as he
trudged along, and the laugh would be without the
slightest bitterness. His lot had been so infinitely
worse, and he had such a happy nature, yielding
sweetly to the inevitable, that he saw now only
cause for amusement.

He had been in that vicinity about three weeks
when one day he met the woman. He knew her
at once, although she was greatly changed. She
had grown stout, although, poor soul! it seemed as
if there had been no reason for it. She was not
unwieldy, but she was stout, and all the contours of
earlier life had disappeared beneath layers of flesh.
Her hair was not gray, but the bright brown had
faded, and she wore it tightly strained back from
her seamed forehead, although it was thin. One had
only to look at her hair to realize that she was a
woman who had given up, who no longer cared.
She was humbly clad in a blue-cotton wrapper, she
wore a dingy black hat, and she carried a tin pail
half full of raspberries. When the man and woman
met they stopped with a sort of shock, and each
changed face grew like the other in its pallor. She
recognized him and he her, but along with that
recognition was awakened a fierce desire to keep it
secret. His prison record loomed up before the
man, the woman's past loomed up before her. She
had possibly not been guilty of much, but her life
was nothing to waken pride in her. She felt shamed
before this man whom she had loved, and who felt
shamed before her. However, after a second the
silence was broken. The man recovered his self-
possession first.

He spoke casually.

"Nice day," said he.

The woman nodded.

"Been berrying?" inquired David. The woman
nodded again.

David looked scrutinizingly at her pail. "I saw
better berries real thick a piece back," said he.

The woman murmured something. In spite of
herself, a tear trickled over her fat, weather-beaten
cheek. David saw the tear, and something warm
and glorious like sunlight seemed to waken within
him.  He felt such tenderness and pity for this
poor feminine thing who had not the strength
to keep the tears back, and was so pitiably shorn
of youth and grace, that he himself expanded. He
had heard in the town something of her history.
She had made a dreadful marriage, tragedy and
suspicion had entered her life, and the direst poverty.
However, he had not known that she was in the vi-
cinity. Somebody had told him she was out West.

"Living here?" he inquired.

"Working for my board at a house back there,"
she muttered. She did not tell him that she had
come as a female "hobo" in a freight-car from the
Western town where she had been finally stranded.
"Mrs. White sent me out for berries," she added.
"She keeps boarders, and there were no berries in
the market this morning."

"Come back with me and I will show you where
I saw the berries real thick," said David.

He turned himself about, and she followed a little
behind, the female failure in the dust cast by the
male.  Neither spoke until David stopped and
pointed to some bushes where the fruit hung thick
on bending, slender branches.

"Here," said David. Both fell to work. David
picked handfuls of berries and cast them gaily into
the pail. "What is your name?" he asked, in an
undertone.

"Jane Waters," she replied, readily. Her hus-
band's name had been Waters, or the man who had
called himself her husband, and her own middle
name was Jane. The first was Sara. David remem-
bered at once. "She is taking her own middle name
and the name of the man she married," he thought.
Then he asked, plucking berries, with his eyes averted:

"Married?"

"No," said the woman, flushing deeply.

David's next question betrayed him. "Husband
dead?"

"I haven't any husband," she replied, like the
Samaritan woman.

She had married a man already provided with
another wife, although she had not known it. The
man was not dead, but she spoke the entire miser-
able truth when she replied as she did. David as-
sumed that he was dead. He felt a throb of relief,
of which he was ashamed, but he could not down it.
He did not know what it was that was so alive and
triumphant within him: love, or pity, or the natural
instinct of the decent male to shelter and protect.
Whatever it was, it was dominant.

"Do you have to work hard?" he asked.

"Pretty hard, I guess. I expect to."

"And you don't get any pay?"

"That's all right; I don't expect to get any,"
said she, and there was bitterness in her voice.

In spite of her stoutness she was not as strong as
the man. She was not at all strong, and, moreover,
the constant presence of a sense of injury at the
hands of life filled her very soul with a subtle poison,
to her weakening vitality. She was a child hurt and
worried and bewildered, although she was to the
average eye a stout, able-bodied, middle-aged wom-
an; but David had not the average eye, and he
saw her as she really was, not as she seemed. There
had always been about her a little weakness and
dependency which had appealed to him. Now they
seemed fairly to cry out to him like the despairing
voices of the children whom he had never had, and
he knew he loved her as he had never loved her be-
fore, with a love which had budded and flowered
and fruited and survived absence and starvation.
He spoke abruptly.

"I've about got my business done in these parts,"
said he. "I've got quite a little money, and I've
got a little house, not much, but mighty snug, back
where I come from. There's a garden. It's in the
woods. Not much passing nor going on."

The woman was looking at him with incredulous,
pitiful eyes like a dog's. "I hate much goin' on,"
she whispered.

"Suppose," said David, "you take those berries
home and pack up your things. Got much?"

"All I've got will go in my bag."

"Well, pack up; tell the madam where you live
that you're sorry, but you're worn out --"

"God knows I am," cried the woman, with sudden
force, "worn out!"

"Well, you tell her that, and say you've got an-
other chance, and --"

"What do you mean?" cried the woman, and she
hung upon his words like a drowning thing.

"Mean? Why, what I mean is this. You pack
your bag and come to the parson's back there, that
white house."

"I know --"

"In the mean time I'll see about getting a license,
and --"

Suddenly the woman set her pail down and
clutched him by both hands. "Say you are not
married," she demanded; "say it, swear it!"

"Yes, I do swear it," said David. "You are the
only woman I ever asked to marry me. I can sup-
port you. We sha'n't be rolling in riches, but we
can be comfortable, and -- I rather guess I can make
you happy."

"You didn't say what your name was," said the
woman.

"David Anderson."

The woman looked at him with a strange ex-
pression, the expression of one who loves and re-
spects, even reveres, the isolation and secrecy of
another soul. She understood, down to the depths
of her being she understood. She had lived a hard
life, she had her faults, but she was fine enough to
comprehend and hold sacred another personality.
She was very pale, but she smiled. Then she turned
to go.

"How long will it take you?" asked David.

"About an hour."

"All right. I will meet you in front of the par-
son's house in an hour. We will go back by train.
I have money enough."

"I'd just as soon walk." The woman spoke with
the utmost humility of love and trust.  She had
not even asked where the man lived. All her life
she had followed him with her soul, and it would
go hard if her poor feet could not keep pace with
her soul.

"No, it is too far; we will take the train. One
goes at half past four."

At half past four the couple, made man and wife,
were on the train speeding toward the little home
in the woods. The woman had frizzled her thin
hair pathetically and ridiculously over her temples;
on her left hand gleamed a white diamond. She had
kept it hidden; she had almost starved rather than
part with it. She gazed out of the window at the
flying landscape, and her thin lips were curved in a
charming smile. The man sat beside her, staring
straight ahead as if at happy visions.

They lived together afterward in the little house
in the woods, and were happy with a strange crys-
tallized happiness at which they would have mocked
in their youth, but which they now recognized as the
essential of all happiness upon earth. And always
the woman knew what she knew about her husband,
and the man knew about his wife, and each recog-
nized the other as old lover and sweetheart come
together at last, but always each kept the knowledge
from the other with an infinite tenderness of deli-
cacy which was as a perfumed garment veiling the
innermost sacredness of love.




THE BALKING OF CHRISTOPHER





THE BALKING OF
CHRISTOPHER

THE spring was early that year.  It was only
the last of March, but the trees were filmed
with green and paling with promise of bloom; the
front yards were showing new grass pricking through
the old. It was high time to plow the south field
and the garden, but Christopher sat in his rocking-
chair beside the kitchen window and gazed out, and
did absolutely nothing about it.

Myrtle Dodd, Christopher's wife, washed the
breakfast dishes, and later kneaded the bread, all
the time glancing furtively at her husband. She
had a most old-fashioned deference with regard to
Christopher. She was always a little afraid of him.
Sometimes Christopher's mother, Mrs. Cyrus Dodd,
and his sister Abby, who had never married, re-
proached her for this attitude of mind. "You are
entirely too much cowed down by Christopher,"
Mrs. Dodd said.

"I would never be under the thumb of any man,"
Abby said.

"Have you ever seen Christopher in one of his
spells?" Myrtle would ask.

Then Mrs. Cyrus Dodd and Abby would look
at each other. "It is all your fault, mother," Abby
would say. "You really ought not to have allowed
your son to have his own head so much."

"You know perfectly well, Abby, what I had to
contend against," replied Mrs. Dodd, and Abby
became speechless.  Cyrus Dodd, now deceased
some twenty years, had never during his whole life
yielded to anything but birth and death. Before
those two primary facts even his terrible will was
powerless. He had come into the world without
his consent being obtained; he had passed in like
manner from it. But during his life he had ruled,
a petty monarch, but a most thorough one. He had
spoiled Christopher, and his wife, although a woman
of high spirit, knew of no appealing.

"I could never go against your father, you know
that," said Mrs. Dodd, following up her advantage.

"Then," said Abby, "you ought to have warned
poor Myrtle. It was a shame to let her marry a
man as spoiled as Christopher."

"I would have married him, anyway," declared
Myrtle with sudden defiance; and her mother-in-
law regarded her approvingly.

"There are worse men than Christopher, and
Myrtle knows it," said she.

"Yes, I do, mother," agreed Myrtle. "Christo-
pher hasn't one bad habit."

"I don't know what you call a bad habit," re-
torted Abby. "I call having your own way in spite
of the world, the flesh, and the devil rather a bad
habit. Christopher tramples on everything in his
path, and he always has. He tramples on poor Myrtle."

At that Myrtle laughed. "I don't think I look
trampled on," said she; and she certainly did not.
Pink and white and plump was Myrtle, although she
had, to a discerning eye, an expression which denoted
extreme nervousness.

This morning of spring, when her husband sat
doing nothing, she wore this nervous expression. Her
blue eyes looked dark and keen; her forehead was
wrinkled; her rosy mouth was set. Myrtle and
Christopher were not young people; they were a
little past middle age, still far from old in look or
ability.

Myrtle had kneaded the bread to rise for the
last time before it was put into the oven, and had
put on the meat to boil for dinner, before she dared
address that silent figure which had about it some-
thing tragic. Then she spoke in a small voice.
"Christopher," said she.

Christopher made no reply.

"It is a good morning to plow, ain't it?" said
Myrtle.

Christopher was silent.

"Jim Mason got over real early; I suppose he
thought you'd want to get at the south field. He's
been sitting there at the barn door for 'most two
hours."

Then Christopher rose. Myrtle's anxious face
lightened. But to her wonder her husband went
into the front entry and got his best hat. "He
ain't going to wear his best hat to plow," thought
Myrtle. For an awful moment it occurred to her
that something had suddenly gone wrong with her
husband's mind. Christopher brushed the hat care-
fully, adjusted it at the little looking-glass in the
kitchen, and went out.

"Be you going to plow the south field?" Myrtle
said, faintly.

"No, I ain't."

"Will you be back to dinner?"

"I don't know -- you needn't worry if I'm not."
Suddenly Christopher did an unusual thing for him.
He and Myrtle had lived together for years, and out-
ward manifestations of affection were rare between
them. He put his arm around her and kissed her.

After he had gone, Myrtle watched him out of
sight down the road; then she sat down and wept.
Jim Mason came slouching around from his station
at the barn door. He surveyed Myrtle uneasily.

"Mr. Dodd sick?" said he at length.

"Not that I know of," said Myrtle, in a weak
quaver. She rose and, keeping her tear-stained face
aloof, lifted the lid off the kettle on the stove.

"D'ye know am he going to plow to-day?"

"He said he wasn't."

Jim grunted, shifted his quid, and slouched out of
the yard.

Meantime Christopher Dodd went straight down
the road to the minister's, the Rev. Stephen Wheaton.
When he came to the south field, which he was
neglecting, he glanced at it turning emerald upon
the gentle slopes. He set his face harder. Christo-
pher Dodd's face was in any case hard-set. Now
it was tragic, to be pitied, but warily, lest it turn
fiercely upon the one who pitied. Christopher was
a handsome man, and his face had an almost classic
turn of feature. His forehead was noble; his eyes
full of keen light. He was only a farmer, but in
spite of his rude clothing he had the face of a man
who followed one of the professions. He was in
sore trouble of spirit, and he was going to consult
the minister and ask him for advice. Christopher
had never done this before. He had a sort of in-
credulity now that he was about to do it. He had
always associated that sort of thing with womankind,
and not with men like himself. And, moreover,
Stephen Wheaton was a younger man than himself.
He was unmarried, and had only been settled in the
village for about a year. "He can't think I'm com-
ing to set my cap at him, anyway," Christopher
reflected, with a sort of grim humor, as he drew
near the parsonage. The minister was haunted by
marriageable ladies of the village.

"Guess you are glad to see a man coming, instead
of a woman who has doubts about some doctrine,"
was the first thing Christopher said to the minister
when he had been admitted to his study. The
study was a small room, lined with books, and only
one picture hung over the fireplace, the portrait of
the minister's mother -- Stephen was so like her that
a question concerning it was futile.

Stephen colored a little angrily at Christopher's
remark -- he was a hot-tempered man, although a
clergyman; then he asked him to be seated.

Christopher sat down opposite the minister. "I
oughtn't to have spoken so," he apologized, "but
what I am doing ain't like me."

"That's all right," said Stephen. He was a short,
athletic man, with an extraordinary width of shoul-
ders and a strong-featured and ugly face, still indica-
tive of goodness and a strange power of sympathy.
Three little mongrel dogs were sprawled about the
study. One, small and alert, came and rested his
head on Christopher's knee. Animals all liked him.
Christopher mechanically patted him. Patting an
appealing animal was as unconscious with the man
as drawing his breath. But he did not even look at
the little dog while he stroked it after the fashion
which pleased it best. He kept his large, keen,
melancholy eyes fixed upon the minister; at length
he spoke. He did not speak with as much eagerness
as he did with force, bringing the whole power of
his soul into his words, which were the words of a
man in rebellion against the greatest odds on earth
and in all creation -- the odds of fate itself.

"I have come to say a good deal, Mr. Wheaton,"
he began.

"Then say it, Mr. Dodd," replied Stephen, without
a smile.

Christopher spoke. "I am going back to the very
beginning of things," said he, "and maybe you will
think it blasphemy, but I don't mean it for that.
I mean it for the truth, and the truth which is too
much for my comprehension."

"I have heard men swear when it did not seem
blasphemy to me," said Stephen.

"Thank the Lord, you ain't so deep in your rut
you can't see the stars!" said Christopher. "But
I guess you see them in a pretty black sky sometimes.
In the beginning, why did I have to come into the
world without any choice?"

"You must not ask a question of me which can
only be answered by the Lord," said Stephen.

"I am asking the Lord," said Christopher, with
his sad, forceful voice. "I am asking the Lord, and
I ask why?"

"You have no right to expect your question to be
answered in your time," said Stephen.

"But here am I," said Christopher, "and I was
a question to the Lord from the first, and fifty years
and more I have been on the earth."

"Fifty years and more are nothing for the answer
to such a question," said Stephen.

Christopher looked at him with mournful dissent;
there was no anger about him. "There was time
before time," said he, "before the fifty years and
more began.  I don't mean to blaspheme, Mr.
Wheaton, but it is the truth. I came into the world
whether I would or not; I was forced, and then I was
told I was a free agent. I am no free agent. For
fifty years and more I have thought about it, and
I have found out that, at least. I am a slave -- a
slave of life."

"For that matter," said Stephen, looking curi-
ously at him, "so am I. So are we all."

"That makes it worse," agreed Christopher -- "a
whole world of slaves. I know I ain't talking in
exactly what you might call an orthodox strain. I
have got to a point when it seems to me I shall go
mad if I don't talk to somebody. I know there is that
awful why, and you can't answer it; and no man
living can. I'm willing to admit that sometime, in
another world, that why will get an answer, but
meantime it's an awful thing to live in this world
without it if a man has had the kind of life I have.
My life has been harder for me than a harder life
might be for another man who was different. That
much I know. There is one thing I've got to be
thankful for. I haven't been the means of sending
any more slaves into this world. I am glad my wife
and I haven't any children to ask 'why?'

"Now, I've begun at the beginning; I'm going on.
I have never had what men call luck. My folks
were poor; father and mother were good, hard-
working people, but they had nothing but trouble,
sickness, and death, and losses by fire and flood.
We lived near the river, and one spring our house
went, and every stick we owned, and much as ever
we all got out alive. Then lightning struck father's
new house, and the insurance company had failed,
and we never got a dollar of insurance. Then my
oldest brother died, just when he was getting started
in business, and his widow and two little children
came on father to support. Then father got rheu-
matism, and was all twisted, and wasn't good for
much afterward; and my sister Sarah, who had been
expecting to get married, had to give it up and take
in sewing and stay at home and take care of the
rest. There was father and George's widow -- she
was never good for much at work -- and mother and
Abby. She was my youngest sister. As for me, I
had a liking for books and wanted to get an educa-
tion; might just as well have wanted to get a seat
on a throne. I went to work in the grist-mill of the
place where we used to live when I was only a boy.
Then, before I was twenty, I saw that Sarah wasn't
going to hold out. She had grieved a good deal,
poor thing, and worked too hard, so we sold out
and came here and bought my farm, with the mort-
gage hitching it, and I went to work for dear life.
Then Sarah died, and then father. Along about then
there was a girl I wanted to marry, but, Lord, how
could I even ask her? My farm started in as a
failure, and it has kept it up ever since. When there
wasn't a drought there was so much rain everything
mildewed; there was a hail-storm that cut every-
thing to pieces, and there was the caterpillar year.
I just managed to pay the interest on the mortgage;
as for paying the principal, I might as well have tried
to pay the national debt.

"Well, to go back to that girl. She is married
and don't live here, and you ain't like ever to see
her, but she was a beauty and something more. I
don't suppose she ever looked twice at me, but
losing what you've never had sometimes is worse
than losing everything you've got. When she got
married I guess I knew a little about what the
martyrs went through.

"Just after that George's widow got married again
and went away to live. It took a burden off the
rest of us, but I had got attached to the children.
The little girl, Ellen, seemed 'most like my own.
Then poor Myrtle came here to live. She did
dressmaking and boarded with our folks, and I
begun to see that she was one of the nervous sort of
women who are pretty bad off alone in the world,
and I told her about the other girl, and she said she
didn't mind, and we got married. By that time
mother's brother John -- he had never got married --
died and left her a little money, so she and my sister
Abby could screw along. They bought the little
house they live in and left the farm, for Abby was
always hard to get along with, though she is a
good woman. Mother, though she is a smart woman,
is one of the sort who don't feel called upon to inter-
fere much with men-folks. I guess she didn't inter-
fere any too much for my good, or father's, either.
Father was a set man. I guess if mother had been a
little harsh with me I might not have asked that
awful 'why?' I guess I might have taken my bitter
pills and held my tongue, but I won't blame myself
on poor mother.

"Myrtle and I get on well enough. She seems
contented -- she has never said a word to make me
think she wasn't. She isn't one of the kind of
women who want much besides decent treatment
and a home. Myrtle is a good woman. I am sorry
for her that she got married to me, for she deserved
somebody who could make her a better husband.
All the time, every waking minute, I've been growing
more and more rebellious.

"You see, Mr. Wheaton, never in this world have
I had what I wanted, and more than wanted --
needed, and needed far more than happiness. I
have never been able to think of work as anything
but a way to get money, and it wasn't right, not
for a man like me, with the feelings I was born with.
And everything has gone wrong even about the
work for the money. I have been hampered and
hindered, I don't know whether by Providence or
the Evil One. I have saved just six hundred and
forty dollars, and I have only paid the interest on
the mortgage. I knew I ought to have a little ahead
in case Myrtle or I got sick, so I haven't tried to
pay the mortgage, but put a few dollars at a time
in the savings-bank, which will come in handy now."

The minister regarded him uneasily. "What," he
asked, "do you mean to do?"

"I mean," replied Christopher, "to stop trying to
do what I am hindered in doing, and do just once in
my life what I want to do. Myrtle asked me this
morning if I wasn't going to plow the south field.
Well, I ain't going to plow the south field. I ain't
going to make a garden. I ain't going to try for
hay in the ten-acre lot. I have stopped. I have
worked for nothing except just enough to keep soul
and body together. I have had bad luck. But that
isn't the real reason why I have stopped. Look at
here, Mr. Wheaton, spring is coming. I have never
in my life had a chance at the spring nor the summer.
This year I'm going to have the spring and the sum-
mer, and the fall, too, if I want it. My apples may
fall and rot if they want to. I am going to get as
much good of the season as they do."

"What are you going to do?" asked Stephen.

"Well, I will tell you. I ain't a man to make
mystery if I am doing right, and I think I am. You
know, I've got a little shack up on Silver Mountain
in the little sugar-orchard I own there; never got
enough sugar to say so, but I put up the shack one
year when I was fool enough to think I might get
something. Well, I'm going up there, and I'm going
to live there awhile, and I'm going to sense the
things I have had to hustle by for the sake of a
few dollars and cents."

"But what will your wife do?"

"She can have the money I've saved, all except
enough to buy me a few provisions. I sha'n't need
much. I want a little corn meal, and I will have a
few chickens, and there is a barrel of winter apples
left over that she can't use, and a few potatoes.
There is a spring right near the shack, and there are
trout-pools, and by and by there will be berries,
and there's plenty of fire-wood, and there's an old
bed and a stove and a few things in the shack.
Now, I'm going to the store and buy what I want,
and I'm going to fix it so Myrtle can draw the money
when she wants it, and then I am going to the
shack, and" -- Christopher's voice took on a solemn
tone -- "I will tell you in just a few words the gist
of what I am going for. I have never in my life
had enough of the bread of life to keep my soul
nourished. I have tried to do my duties, but I believe
sometimes duties act on the soul like weeds on a
flower. They crowd it out. I am going up on Silver
Mountain to get once, on this earth, my fill of the
bread of life."

Stephen Wheaton gasped. "But your wife, she
will be alone, she will worry."

"I want you to go and tell her," said Christopher,
"and I've got my bank-book here; I'm going to
write some checks that she can get cashed when she
needs money. I want you to tell her. Myrtle won't
make a fuss. She ain't the kind. Maybe she will
be a little lonely, but if she is, she can go and visit
somewhere." Christopher rose. "Can you let me
have a pen and ink?" said he, "and I will write
those checks. You can tell Myrtle how to use
them. She won't know how."

Stephen Wheaton, an hour later, sat in his study,
the checks in his hand, striving to rally his courage.
Christopher had gone; he had seen him from his
window, laden with parcels, starting upon the ascent
of Silver Mountain. Christopher had made out
many checks for small amounts, and Stephen held
the sheaf in his hand, and gradually his courage
to arise and go and tell Christopher's wife gained
strength. At last he went.

Myrtle was looking out of the window, and she
came quickly to the door. She looked at him, her
round, pretty face gone pale, her plump hands
twitching at her apron.

"What is it?" said she.

"Nothing to be alarmed about," replied Stephen.

Then the two entered the house. Stephen found
his task unexpectedly easy. Myrtle Dodd was an
unusual woman in a usual place.

"It is all right for my husband to do as he pleases,"
she said with an odd dignity, as if she were defending
him.

"Mr. Dodd is a strange man. He ought to have
been educated and led a different life," Stephen said,
lamely, for he reflected that the words might be
hard for the woman to hear, since she seemed obvi-
ously quite fitted to her life, and her life to her.

But Myrtle did not take it hardly, seemingly rather
with pride. "Yes," said she, "Christopher ought
to have gone to college. He had the head for it.
Instead of that he has just stayed round here and
dogged round the farm, and everything has gone
wrong lately. He hasn't had any luck even with
that." Then poor Myrtle Dodd said an unexpectedly
wise thing. "But maybe," said Myrtle, "his bad
luck may turn out the best thing for him in the end."

Stephen was silent. Then he began explaining
about the checks.

"I sha'n't use any more of his savings than I can
help," said Myrtle, and for the first time her voice
quavered. "He must have some clothes up there,"
said she. "There ain't bed-coverings, and it is
cold nights, late as it is in the spring. I wonder
how I can get the bedclothes and other things to
him. I can't drive, myself, and I don't like to hire
anybody; aside from its being an expense, it would
make talk. Mother Dodd and Abby won't make
talk outside the family, but I suppose it will have
to be known."

"Mr. Dodd didn't want any mystery made over
it," Stephen Wheaton said.

"There ain't going to be any mystery. Christo-
pher has got a right to live awhile on Silver Mountain
if he wants to," returned Myrtle with her odd,
defiant air.

"But I will take the things up there to him, if you
will let me have a horse and wagon," said Stephen.

"I will, and be glad. When will you go?"

"To-morrow."

"I'll have them ready," said Myrtle.

After the minister had gone she went into her
own bedroom and cried a little and made the moan
of a loving woman sadly bewildered by the ways
of man, but loyal as a soldier. Then she dried
her tears and began to pack a load for the
wagon.

The next morning early, before the dew was off
the young grass, Stephen Wheaton started with the
wagon-load, driving the great gray farm-horse up
the side of Silver Mountain. The road was fairly
good, making many winds in order to avoid steep
ascents, and Stephen drove slowly. The gray farm-
horse was sagacious. He knew that an unaccustomed
hand held the lines; he knew that of a right he should
be treading the plowshares instead of climbing a
mountain on a beautiful spring morning.

But as for the man driving, his face was radiant,
his eyes of young manhood lit with the light of the
morning. He had not owned it, but he himself had
sometimes chafed under the dull necessity of his life,
but here was excitement, here was exhilaration. He
drew the sweet air into his lungs, and the deeper
meaning of the spring morning into his soul. Christo-
pher Dodd interested him to the point of enthusiasm.
Not even the uneasy consideration of the lonely,
mystified woman in Dodd's deserted home could
deprive him of admiration for the man's flight into
the spiritual open. He felt that these rights of the
man were of the highest, and that other rights, even
human and pitiful ones, should give them the right
of way.

It was not a long drive. When he reached the
shack -- merely a one-roomed hut, with a stove-
pipe chimney, two windows, and a door -- Christo-
pher stood at the entrance and seemed to illuminate
it.  Stephen for a minute doubted his identity.
Christopher had lost middle age in a day's time.
He had the look of a triumphant youth. Blue smoke
was curling from the chimney. Stephen smelled
bacon frying, and coffee.

Christopher greeted him with the joyousness of
a child. "Lord!" said he, "did Myrtle send you up
with all those things? Well, she is a good woman.
Guess I would have been cold last night if I hadn't
been so happy. How is Myrtle?"

"She seemed to take it very sensibly when I told
her."

Christopher nodded happily and lovingly. "She
would. She can understand not understanding, and
that is more than most women can. It was mighty
good of you to bring the things. You are in time
for breakfast. Lord! Mr. Wheaton, smell the trees,
and there are blooms hidden somewhere that smell
sweet. Think of having the common food of man
sweetened this way! First time I fully sensed I was
something more than just a man. Lord, I am paid
already. It won't be so very long before I get my
fill, at this rate, and then I can go back. To think
I needn't plow to-day! To think all I have to do
is to have the spring! See the light under those
trees!"

Christopher spoke like a man in ecstasy. He tied
the gray horse to a tree and brought a pail of water
for him from the spring near by.

Then he said to Stephen: "Come right in. The
bacon's done, and the coffee and the corn-cake and
the eggs won't take a minute."

The two men entered the shack. There was noth-
ing there except the little cooking-stove, a few
kitchen utensils hung on pegs on the walls, an old
table with a few dishes, two chairs, and a lounge
over which was spread an ancient buffalo-skin.

Stephen sat down, and Christopher fried the eggs.
Then he bade the minister draw up, and the two
men breakfasted.

"Ain't it great, Mr. Wheaton?" said Christopher.

"You are a famous cook, Mr. Dodd," laughed
Stephen. He was thoroughly enjoying himself, and
the breakfast was excellent.

"It ain't that," declared Christopher in his ex-
alted voice. "It ain't that, young man. It's be-
cause the food is blessed."

Stephen stayed all day on Silver Mountain. He
and Christopher went fishing, and had fried trout for
dinner. He took some of the trout home to Myrtle.

Myrtle received them with a sort of state which
defied the imputation of sadness. "Did he seem
comfortable?" she asked.

"Comfortable, Mrs. Dodd? I believe it will mean
a new lease of life to your husband. He is an un-
common man."

"Yes, Christopher is uncommon; he always was,"
assented Myrtle.

"You have everything you want? You were not
timid last night alone?" asked the minister.

"Yes, I was timid. I heard queer noises," said
Myrtle, "but I sha'n't be alone any more. Chris-
topher's niece wrote me she was coming to make
a visit. She has been teaching school, and she lost
her school. I rather guess Ellen is as uncommon for
a girl as Christopher is for a man. Anyway, she's
lost her school, and her brother's married, and she
don't want to go there. Besides, they live in Boston,
and Ellen, she says she can't bear the city in spring
and summer. She wrote she'd saved a little, and
she'd pay her board, but I sha'n't touch a dollar of
her little savings, and neither would Christopher
want me to. He's always thought a sight of Ellen,
though he's never seen much of her. As for me, I
was so glad when her letter came I didn't know
what to do. Christopher will be glad. I suppose
you'll be going up there to see him off and
on."  Myrtle spoke a bit wistfully, and Ste-
phen did not tell her he had been urged to come
often.

"Yes, off and on," he replied.

"If you will just let me know when you are going,
I will see that you have something to take to him
-- some bread and pies."

"He has some chickens there," said Stephen.

"Has he got a coop for them?"

"Yes, he had one rigged up. He will have plenty
of eggs, and he carried up bacon and corn meal and
tea and coffee."

"I am glad of that," said Myrtle. She spoke with
a quiet dignity, but her face never lost its expression
of bewilderment and resignation.

The next week Stephen Wheaton carried Myrtle's
bread and pies to Christopher on his mountainside.
He drove Christopher's gray horse harnessed in his
old buggy, and realized that he himself was getting
much pleasure out of the other man's idiosyncrasy.
The morning was beautiful, and Stephen carried in
his mind a peculiar new beauty, besides. Ellen,
Christopher's niece, had arrived the night before,
and, early as it was, she had been astir when he
reached the Dodd house. She had opened the door
for him, and she was a goodly sight: a tall girl,
shaped like a boy, with a fearless face of great beauty
crowned with compact gold braids and lit by un-
swerving blue eyes. Ellen had a square, determined
chin and a brow of high resolve.

"Good morning," said she, and as she spoke she
evidently rated Stephen and approved, for she smiled
genially. "I am Mr. Dodd's niece," said she. "You
are the minister?"

"Yes."

"And you have come for the things aunt is to
send him?"

"Yes."

"Aunt said you were to drive uncle's horse and
take the buggy," said Ellen. "It is very kind of you.
While you are harnessing, aunt and I will pack the
basket."

Stephen, harnessing the gray horse, had a sense
of shock; whether pleasant or otherwise, he could
not determine. He had never seen a girl in the least
like Ellen. Girls had never impressed him. She
did.

When he drove around to the kitchen door she
and Myrtle were both there, and he drank a cup of
coffee before starting, and Myrtle introduced him.
"Only think, Mr. Wheaton," said she, "Ellen says
she knows a great deal about farming, and we are
going to hire Jim Mason and go right ahead."
Myrtle looked adoringly at Ellen.

Stephen spoke eagerly. "Don't hire anybody,"
he said. "I used to work on a farm to pay my way
through college. I need the exercise. Let me help."

"You may do that," said Ellen, "on shares.
Neither aunt nor I can think of letting you work
without any recompense."

"Well, we will settle that," Stephen replied.
When he drove away, his usually calm mind was in
a tumult.

"Your niece has come," he told Christopher,
when the two men were breakfasting together on
Silver Mountain.

"I am glad of that," said Christopher. "All that
troubled me about being here was that Myrtle might
wake up in the night and hear noises."

Christopher had grown even more radiant. He
was effulgent with pure happiness.

"You aren't going to tap your sugar-maples?"
said Stephen, looking up at the great symmetrical
efflorescence of rose and green which towered about
them.

Christopher laughed. "No, bless 'em," said he,
"the trees shall keep their sugar this season. This
week is the first time I've had a chance to get ac-
quainted with them and sort of enter into their feel-
ings. Good Lord! I've seen how I can love those
trees, Mr. Wheaton! See the pink on their young
leaves! They know more than you and I. They
know how to grow young every spring."

Stephen did not tell Christopher how Ellen and
Myrtle were to work the farm with his aid. The two
women had bade him not. Christopher seemed to
have no care whatever about it. He was simply
happy. When Stephen left, he looked at him and
said, with the smile of a child, "Do you think I am
crazy?"

"Crazy? No," replied Stephen.

"Well, I ain't. I'm just getting fed. I was starv-
ing to death. Glad you don't think I'm crazy, be-
cause I couldn't help matters by saying I wasn't.
Myrtle don't think I am, I know. As for Ellen, I
haven't seen her since she was a little girl. I don't
believe she can be much like Myrtle; but I guess if
she is what she promised to turn out she wouldn't
think anybody ought to go just her way to have it
the right way."

"I rather think she is like that, although I saw
her for the first time this morning," said Stephen.

"I begin to feel that I may not need to stay here
much longer," Christopher called after him. "I
begin to feel that I am getting what I came for so
fast that I can go back pretty soon."

But it was the last day of July before he came.
He chose the cool of the evening after a burning day,
and descended the mountain in the full light of the
moon. He had gone up the mountain like an old
man; he came down like a young one.

When he came at last in sight of his own home,
he paused and stared. Across the grass-land a
heavily laden wagon was moving toward his barn.
Upon this wagon heaped with hay, full of silver
lights from the moon, sat a tall figure all in white,
which seemed to shine above all things. Christopher
did not see the man on the other side of the wagon
leading the horses; he saw only this wonderful
white figure. He hurried forward and Myrtle came
down the road to meet him. She had been watch-
ing for him, as she had watched every night.

"Who is it on the load of hay?" asked Christopher.

"Ellen," replied Myrtle.

"Oh!" said Christopher. "She looked like an
angel of the Lord, come to take up the burden I had
dropped while I went to learn of Him."

"Be you feeling pretty well, Christopher?" asked
Myrtle. She thought that what her husband had
said was odd, but he looked well, and he might have
said it simply because he was a man.

Christopher put his arm around Myrtle. "I am
better than I ever was in my whole life, Myrtle,
and I've got more courage to work now than I had
when I was young. I had to go away and get rested,
but I've got rested for all my life. We shall get
along all right as long as we live."

"Ellen and the minister are going to get married
come Christmas," said Myrtle.

"She is lucky. He is a man that can see with the
eyes of other people," said Christopher.

It was after the hay had been unloaded and Chris-
topher had been shown the garden full of lusty
vegetables, and told of the great crop with no draw-
back, that he and the minister had a few minutes
alone together at the gate.

"I want to tell you, Mr. Wheaton, that I am
settled in my mind now. I shall never complain
again, no matter what happens. I have found that
all the good things and all the bad things that come
to a man who tries to do right are just to prove to
him that he is on the right path. They are just the
flowers and sunbeams, and the rocks and snakes,
too, that mark the way. And -- I have found out
more than that. I have found out the answer to my
'why?'"

"What is it?" asked Stephen, gazing at him curi-
ously from the wonder-height of his own special
happiness.

"I have found out that the only way to heaven
for the children of men is through the earth," said
Christopher.





DEAR ANNIE




DEAR ANNIE

ANNIE HEMPSTEAD lived on a large family
canvas, being the eldest of six children. There
was only one boy. The mother was long since dead.
If one can imagine the Hempstead family, the head of
which was the Reverend Silas, pastor of the Orthodox
Church in Lynn Corners, as being the subject of a
mild study in village history, the high light would
probably fall upon Imogen, the youngest daughter.
As for Annie, she would apparently supply only a
part of the background.

This afternoon in late July, Annie was out in the
front yard of the parsonage, assisting her brother
Benny to rake hay. Benny had not cut it. Annie
had hired a man, although the Hempsteads could
not afford to hire a man, but she had said to Benny,
"Benny, you can rake the hay and get it into the
barn if Jim Mullins cuts it, can't you?" And Benny
had smiled and nodded acquiescence. Benny Hemp-
stead always smiled and nodded acquiescence, but
there was in him the strange persistency of a willow
bough, the persistency of pliability, which is the
most unconquerable of all. Benny swayed gracefully
in response to all the wishes of others, but always he
remained in his own inadequate attitude toward life.

Now he was raking to as little purpose as he could
and rake at all. The clover-tops, the timothy grass,
and the buttercups moved before his rake in a faint
foam of gold and green and rose, but his sister Annie
raised whirlwinds with hers. The Hempstead yard
was large and deep, and had two great squares given
over to wild growths on either side of the gravel walk,
which was bordered with shrubs, flowering in their
turn, like a class of children at school saying their
lessons. The spring shrubs had all spelled out their
floral recitations, of course, but great clumps of
peonies were spreading wide skirts of gigantic bloom,
like dancers courtesying low on the stage of summer,
and shafts of green-white Yucca lilies and Japan
lilies and clove-pinks still remained in their school
of bloom.

Benny often stood still, wiped his forehead, leaned
on his rake, and inhaled the bouquet of sweet scents,
but Annie raked with never-ceasing energy. Annie
was small and slender and wiry, and moved with
angular grace, her thin, peaked elbows showing be-
neath the sleeves of her pink gingham dress, her thin
knees outlining beneath the scanty folds of the skirt.
Her neck was long, her shoulder-blades troubled the
back of her blouse at every movement. She was a
creature full of ostentatious joints, but the joints
were delicate and rhythmical and charming. Annie
had a charming face, too. It was thin and sun-
burnt, but still charming, with a sweet, eager, intent-
to-please outlook upon life. This last was the real
attitude of Annie's mind; it was, in fact, Annie. She
was intent to please from her toes to the crown of
her brown head. She radiated good will and loving-
kindness as fervently as a lily in the border radiated
perfume.

It was very warm, and the northwest sky had a
threatening mountain of clouds. Occasionally An-
nie glanced at it and raked the faster, and thought
complacently of the water-proof covers in the little
barn. This hay was valuable for the Reverend Silas's
horse.

Two of the front windows of the house were filled
with girls' heads, and the regular swaying movement
of white-clad arms sewing. The girls sat in the
house because it was so sunny on the piazza in the
afternoon. There were four girls in the sitting-
room, all making finery for themselves. On the
other side of the front door one of the two windows
was blank; in the other was visible a nodding gray
head, that of Annie's father taking his afternoon nap.

Everything was still except the girls' tongues, an
occasional burst of laughter, and the crackling shrill
of locusts. Nothing had passed on the dusty road
since Benny and Annie had begun their work. Lynn
Corners was nothing more than a hamlet. It was
even seldom that an automobile got astray there,
being diverted from the little city of Anderson, six
miles away, by turning to the left instead of the right.

Benny stopped again and wiped his forehead, all
pink and beaded with sweat. He was a pretty
young man -- as pretty as a girl, although large. He
glanced furtively at Annie, then he went with a soft,
padding glide, like a big cat, to the piazza and settled
down. He leaned his head against a post, closed his
eyes, and inhaled the sweetness of flowers alive and
dying, of new-mown hay. Annie glanced at him
and an angelic look came over her face. At that
moment the sweetness of her nature seemed actually
visible.

"He is tired, poor boy!" she thought. She also
thought that probably Benny felt the heat more be-
cause he was stout. Then she raked faster and
faster. She fairly flew over the yard, raking the
severed grass and flowers into heaps. The air grew
more sultry. The sun was not yet clouded, but the
northwest was darker and rumbled ominously.

The girls in the sitting-room continued to chatter
and sew. One of them might have come out to help
this little sister toiling alone, but Annie did not think
of that. She raked with the uncomplaining sweet-
ness of an angel until the storm burst. The rain
came down in solid drops, and the sky was a sheet
of clamoring flame. Annie made one motion toward
the barn, but there was no use. The hay was not
half cocked. There was no sense in running for
covers. Benny was up and lumbering into the house,
and her sisters were shutting windows and crying
out to her. Annie deserted her post and fled before
the wind, her pink skirts lashing her heels, her hair
dripping.

When she entered the sitting-room her sisters,
Imogen, Eliza, Jane, and Susan, were all there; also
her father, Silas, tall and gaunt and gray. To the
Hempsteads a thunder-storm partook of the nature
of a religious ceremony. The family gathered to-
gether, and it was understood that they were all
offering prayer and recognizing God as present on
the wings of the tempest. In reality they were all
very nervous in thunder-storms, with the exception
of Annie. She always sent up a little silent petition
that her sisters and brother and father, and the horse
and dog and cat, might escape danger, although she
had never been quite sure that she was not wicked
in including the dog and cat. She was surer about
the horse because he was the means by which her
father made pastoral calls upon his distant sheep.
Then afterward she just sat with the others and
waited until the storm was over and it was time to
open windows and see if the roof had leaked. To-
day, however, she was intent upon the hay. In a
lull of the tempest she spoke.

"It is a pity," she said, "that I was not able to
get the hay cocked and the covers on."

Then Imogen turned large, sarcastic blue eyes
upon her. Imogen was considered a beauty, pink
and white, golden-haired, and dimpled, with a curi-
ous calculating hardness of character and a sharp
tongue, so at variance with her appearance that
people doubted the evidence of their senses.

"If," said Imogen, "you had only made Benny
work instead of encouraging him to dawdle and
finally to stop altogether, and if you had gone out
directly after dinner, the hay would have been all
raked up and covered."

Nothing could have exceeded the calm and in-
structive superiority of Imogen's tone. A mass of
soft white fabric lay upon her lap, although she had
removed scissors and needle and thimble to a safe
distance. She tilted her chin with a royal air. When
the storm lulled she had stopped praying.

Imogen's sisters echoed her and joined in the at-
tack upon Annie.

"Yes," said Jane, "if you had only started earlier,
Annie. I told Eliza when you went out in the yard
that it looked like a shower."

Eliza nodded energetically.

"It was foolish to start so late," said Susan, with
a calm air of wisdom only a shade less exasperating
than Imogen's.

"And you always encourage Benny so in being
lazy," said Eliza.

Then the Reverend Silas joined in. "You should
have more sense of responsibility toward your broth-
er, your only brother, Annie," he said, in his deep
pulpit voice.

"It was after two o'clock when you went out,"
said Imogen.

"And all you had to do was the dinner-dishes, and
there were very few to-day," said Jane.

Then Annie turned with a quick, cat-like motion.
Her eyes blazed under her brown toss of hair. She
gesticulated with her little, nervous hands. Her
voice was as sweet and intense as a reed, and withal
piercing with anger.

"It was not half past one when I went out," said
she, "and there was a whole sinkful of dishes."

"It was after two. I looked at the clock," said
Imogen.

"It was not."

"And there were very few dishes," said Jane.

"A whole sinkful," said Annie, tense with wrath.

"You always are rather late about starting," said
Susan.

"I am not! I was not! I washed the dishes, and
swept the kitchen, and blacked the stove, and cleaned
the silver."

"I swept the kitchen," said Imogen, severely.
"Annie, I am surprised at you."

"And you know I cleaned the silver yesterday,"
said Jane.

Annie gave a gasp and looked from one to the
other.

"You know you did not sweep the kitchen," said
Imogen.

Annie's father gazed at her severely. "My dear,"
he said, "how long must I try to correct you of this
habit of making false statements?"

"Dear Annie does not realize that they are false
statements, father," said Jane. Jane was not pretty,
but she gave the effect of a long, sweet stanza of
some fine poetess. She was very tall and slender and
large-eyed, and wore always a serious smile. She
was attired in a purple muslin gown, cut V-shaped
at the throat, and, as always, a black velvet ribbon
with a little gold locket attached. The locket con-
tained a coil of hair. Jane had been engaged to a
young minister, now dead three years, and he had
given her the locket.

Jane no doubt had mourned for her lover, but she
had a covert pleasure in the romance of her situation.
She was a year younger than Annie, and she had
loved and lost, and so had achieved a sentimental
distinction. Imogen always had admirers. Eliza
had been courted at intervals half-heartedly by a
widower, and Susan had had a few fleeting chances.
But Jane was the only one who had been really defi-
nite in her heart affairs. As for Annie, nobody ever
thought of her in such a connection. It was supposed
that Annie had no thought of marriage, that she was
foreordained to remain unwed and keep house for
her father and Benny.

When Jane said that dear Annie did not realize
that she made false statements, she voiced an opinion
of the family before which Annie was always abso-
lutely helpless. Defense meant counter-accusation.
Annie could not accuse her family. She glanced
from one to the other. In her blue eyes were still
sparks of wrath, but she said nothing. She felt, as
always, speechless, when affairs reached such a junc-
ture. She began, in spite of her good sense, to feel
guiltily responsible for everything -- for the spoiling
of the hay, even for the thunder-storm. What was
more, she even wished to feel guiltily responsible.
Anything was better than to be sure her sisters were
not speaking the truth, that her father was blaming
her unjustly.

Benny, who sat hunched upon himself with the
effect of one set of bones and muscles leaning upon
others for support, was the only one who spoke for
her, and even he spoke to little purpose.

"One of you other girls," said he, in a thick, sweet
voice, "might have come out and helped Annie;
then she could have got the hay in."

They all turned on him.

"It is all very well for you to talk," said Imogen.
"I saw you myself quit raking hay and sit down on
the piazza."

"Yes," assented Jane, nodding violently, "I saw
you, too."

"You have no sense of your responsibility, Ben-
jamin, and your sister Annie abets you in evading
it," said Silas Hempstead with dignity.

"Benny feels the heat," said Annie.

"Father is entirely right," said Eliza. "Benja-
min has no sense of responsibility, and it is mainly
owing to Annie."

"But dear Annie does not realize it," said
Jane.

Benny got up lumberingly and left the room. He
loved his sister Annie, but he hated the mild simmer
of feminine rancor to which even his father's pres-
ence failed to add a masculine flavor. Benny was
always leaving the room and allowing his sisters
"to fight it out."

Just after he left there was a tremendous peal
of thunder and a blue flash, and they all prayed
again, except Annie; who was occupied with her own
perplexities of life, and not at all afraid. She won-
dered, as she had wondered many times before, if
she could possibly be in the wrong, if she were spoil-
ing Benny, if she said and did things without know-
ing that she did so, or the contrary. Then suddenly
she tightened her mouth. She knew. This sweet-
tempered, anxious-to-please Annie was entirely sane,
she had unusual self-poise. She KNEW that she knew
what she did and said, and what she did not do or
say, and a strange comprehension of her family over-
whelmed her. Her sisters were truthful; she would
not admit anything else, even to herself; but they
confused desires and impulses with accomplishment.
They had done so all their lives, some of them from
intense egotism, some possibly from slight twists in
their mental organisms. As for her father, he had
simply rather a weak character, and was swayed by
the majority. Annie, as she sat there among the
praying group, made the same excuse for her sisters
that they made for her. "They don't realize it,"
she said to herself.

When the storm finally ceased she hurried up-
stairs and opened the windows, letting in the rain-
fresh air. Then she got supper, while her sisters
resumed their needlework. A curious conviction
seized her, as she was hurrying about the kitchen,
that in all probability some, if not all, of her sisters
considered that they were getting the supper. Pos-
sibly Jane had reflected that she ought to get supper,
then she had taken another stitch in her work and
had not known fairly that her impulse of duty had
not been carried out. Imogen, presumably, was sew-
ing with the serene consciousness that, since she was
herself, it followed as a matter of course that she was
performing all the tasks of the house.

While Annie was making an omelet Benny came
out into the kitchen and stood regarding her, hands
in pockets, making, as usual, one set of muscles rest
upon another. His face was full of the utmost good
nature, but it also convicted him of too much sloth
to obey its commands.

"Say, Annie, what on earth makes them all pick
on you so?" he observed.

"Hush, Benny! They don't mean to. They don't
know it."

"But say, Annie, you must know that they tell
whoppers. You DID sweep the kitchen."

"Hush, Benny! Imogen really thinks she swept
it."

"Imogen always thinks she has done everything
she ought to do, whether she has done it or not,"
said Benny, with unusual astuteness. "Why don't
you up and tell her she lies, Annie?"

"She doesn't really lie," said Annie.

"She does lie, even if she doesn't know it," said
Benny; "and what is more, she ought to be made to
know it. Say, Annie, it strikes me that you are
doing the same by the girls that they accuse you of
doing by me. Aren't you encouraging them in evil
ways?"

Annie started, and turned and stared at him.

Benny nodded. "I can't see any difference," he
said. "There isn't a day but one of the girls thinks
she has done something you have done, or hasn't
done something you ought to have done, and they
blame you all the time, when you don't deserve it,
and you let them, and they don't know it, and I
don't think myself that they know they tell whop-
pers; but they ought to know. Strikes me you are
just spoiling the whole lot, father thrown in, Annie.
You are a dear, just as they say, but you are too
much of a dear to be good for them."

Annie stared.

"You are letting that omelet burn," said Benny.
"Say, Annie, I will go out and turn that hay in
the morning. I know I don't amount to much, but
I ain't a girl, anyhow, and I haven't got a cross-eyed
soul. That's what ails a lot of girls. They mean all
right, but their souls have been cross-eyed ever
since they came into the world, and it's just such
girls as you who ought to get them straightened
out. You know what has happened to-day. Well,
here's what happened yesterday. I don't tell tales,
but you ought to know this, for I believe Tom Reed
has his eye on you, in spite of Imogen's being such
a beauty, and Susan's having manners like silk,
and Eliza's giving everybody the impression that
she is too good for this earth, and Jane's trying to
make everybody think she is a sweet martyr, with-
out a thought for mortal man, when that is only
her way of trying to catch one. You know Tom
Reed was here last evening?"

Annie nodded.  Her face turned scarlet, then
pathetically pale. She bent over her omelet, care-
fully lifting it around the edges.

"Well," Benny went on, "I know he came to see
you, and Imogen went to the door and ushered him
into the parlor, and I was out on the piazza, and
she didn't know it, but I heard her tell him that she
thought you had gone out. She hinted, too, that
George Wells had taken you to the concert in the
town hall. He did ask you, didn't he?"

"Yes."

"Well, Imogen spoke in this way."  Benny
lowered his voice and imitated Imogen to the life.
"'Yes, we are all well, thank you. Father is busy,
of course; Jane has run over to Mrs. Jacobs's for
a pattern; Eliza is writing letters; and Susan is
somewhere about the house. Annie -- well, Annie --
George Wells asked her to go to the concert -- I
rather --' Then," said Benny, in his natural voice,
"Imogen stopped, and she could say truthfully
that she didn't lie, but anybody would have thought
from what she said that you had gone to the concert
with George Wells."

"Did Tom inquire for me?" asked Annie, in a
low voice.

"Didn't have a chance. Imogen got ahead of
him."

"Oh, well, then it doesn't matter. I dare say he
did come to see Imogen."

"He didn't," said Benny, stoutly. "And that
isn't all. Say, Annie --"

"What?"

"Are you going to marry George Wells? It is
none of my business, but are you?"

Annie laughed a little, although her face was still
pale. She had folded the omelet and was carefully
watching it.

"You need not worry about that, Benny dear,"
she said.

"Then what right have the girls to tell so many
people the nice things they hear you say about him?"

Annie removed the omelet skilfully from the pan
to a hot plate, which she set on the range shelf, and
turned to her brother.

"What nice things do they hear me say?"

"That he is so handsome; that he has such a
good position; that he is the very best young man
in the place; that you should think every girl
would be head over heels in love with him; that
every word he speaks is so bright and clever."

Annie looked at her brother.

"I don't believe you ever said one of those things,"
remarked Benny.

Annie continued to look at him.

"Did you?"

"Benny dear, I am not going to tell you."

"You won't say you never did, because that
would be putting your sisters in the wrong and
admitting that they tell lies. Annie, you are a dear,
but I do think you are doing wrong and spoiling
them as much as they say you are spoiling me."

"Perhaps I am," said Annie. There was a strange,
tragic expression on her keen, pretty little face.
She looked as if her mind was contemplating strenu-
ous action which was changing her very features.
She had covered the finished omelet and was now
cooking another.

"I wish you would see if everybody is in the
house and ready, Benny," said she. "When this
omelet is done they must come right away, or nothing
will be fit to eat. And, Benny dear, if you don't
mind, please get the butter and the cream-pitcher
out of the ice-chest. I have everything else on the
table."

"There is another thing," said Benny. "I don't
go about telling tales, but I do think it is time you
knew. The girls tell everybody that you like to do
the housework so much that they don't dare inter-
fere. And it isn't so. They may have taught them-
selves to think it is so, but it isn't. You would like
a little time for fancy-work and reading as well as
they do."

"Please get the cream and butter, and see if
they are all in the house," said Annie. She spoke
as usual, but the strange expression remained in her
face. It was still there when the family were all
gathered at the table and she was serving the puffy
omelet. Jane noticed it first.

"What makes you look so odd, Annie?" said she.

"I don't know how I look odd," replied Annie.

They all gazed at her then, her father with some
anxiety. "You don't look yourself," he said. "You
are feeling well, aren't you, Annie?"

"Quite well, thank you, father."

But after the omelet was served and the tea
poured Annie rose.

"Where are you going, Annie?" asked Imogen,
in her sarcastic voice.

"To my room, or perhaps out in the orchard."

"It will be sopping wet out there after the shower,"
said Eliza. "Are you crazy, Annie?"

"I have on my black skirt, and I will wear rub-
bers," said Annie, quietly. "I want some fresh air."

"I should think you had enough fresh air. You
were outdoors all the afternoon, while we were
cooped up in the house," said Jane.

"Don't you feel well, Annie?" her father asked
again, a golden bit of omelet poised on his fork, as
she was leaving the room.

"Quite well, father dear."

"But you are eating no supper."

"I have always heard that people who cook don't
need so much to eat," said Imogen. "They say
the essence of the food soaks in through the pores."

"I am quite well," Annie repeated, and the door
closed behind her.

"Dear Annie! She is always doing odd things
like this," remarked Jane.

"Yes, she is, things that one cannot account for,
but Annie is a dear," said Susan.

"I hope she is well," said Annie's father.

"Oh, she is well enough. Don't worry, father,"
said Imogen. "Dear Annie is always doing the
unexpected. She looks very well."

"Yes, dear Annie is quite stout, for her," said Jane.

"I think she is thinner than I have ever seen her,
and the rest of you look like stuffed geese," said
Benny, rudely.

Imogen turned upon him in dignified wrath.
"Benny, you insult your sisters," said she. "Father,
you should really tell Benny that he should bridle
his tongue a little."

"You ought to bridle yours, every one of you,"
retorted Benny. "You girls nag poor Annie every
single minute. You let her do all the work, then
you pick at her for it."

There was a chorus of treble voices. "We nag
dear Annie! We pick at dear Annie! We make
her do everything! Father, you should remonstrate
with Benjamin. You know how we all love dear
Annie!"

"Benjamin," began Silas Hempstead, but Benny,
with a smothered exclamation, was up and out of
the room.

Benny quite frankly disliked his sisters, with the
exception of Annie. For his father he had a sort of
respectful tolerance. He could not see why he should
have anything else. His father had never done
anything for him except to admonish him. His
scanty revenue for his support and college expenses
came from his maternal grandmother, who had been
a woman of parts and who had openly scorned her
son-in-law.

Grandmother Loomis had left a will which occa-
sioned much comment. By its terms she had pro-
vided sparsely but adequately for Benjamin's edu-
cation and living until he should graduate; and her
house, with all her personal property, and the bulk of
the sum from which she had derived her own income,
fell to her granddaughter Annie. Annie had always
been her grandmother's favorite. There had been
covert dismay when the contents of the will were
made known, then one and all had congratulated
the beneficiary, and said abroad that they were glad
dear Annie was so well provided for. It was inti-
mated by Imogen and Eliza that probably dear
Annie would not marry, and in that case Grand-
mother Loomis's bequest was so fortunate. She had
probably taken that into consideration. Grand-
mother Loomis had now been dead four years, and
her deserted home had been for rent, furnished, but
it had remained vacant.

Annie soon came back from the orchard, and after
she had cleared away the supper-table and washed
the dishes she went up to her room, carefully re-
arranged her hair, and changed her dress. Then she
sat down beside a window and waited and watched,
her pointed chin in a cup of one little thin hand, her
soft muslin skirts circling around her, and the scent
of queer old sachet emanating from a flowered ribbon
of her grandmother's which she had tied around her
waist. The ancient scent always clung to the rib-
bon, suggesting faintly as a dream the musk and
roses and violets of some old summer-time.

Annie sat there and gazed out on the front yard,
which was silvered over with moonlight. Annie's
four sisters all sat out there. They had spread a
rug over the damp grass and brought out chairs.
There were five chairs, although there were only
four girls. Annie gazed over the yard and down the
street. She heard the chatter of the girls, which
was inconsequent and absent, as if their minds were
on other things than their conversation. Then sud-
denly she saw a small red gleam far down the street,
evidently that of a cigar, and also a dark, moving
figure. Then there ensued a subdued wrangle in
the yard. Imogen insisted that her sisters should
go into the house. They all resisted, Eliza the most
vehemently. Imogen was arrogant and compelling.
Finally she drove them all into the house except
Eliza, who wavered upon the threshold of yielding.
Imogen was obliged to speak very softly lest the ap-
proaching man hear, but Annie, in the window above
her, heard every word.

"You know he is coming to see me," said Imogen,
passionately. "You know -- you know, Eliza, and
yet every single time he comes, here are you girls,
spying and listening."

"He comes to see Annie, I believe," said Eliza,
in her stubborn voice, which yet had indecision in it.

"He never asks for her."

"He never has a chance. We all tell him, the
minute he comes in, that she is out. But now I am
going to stay, anyway."

"Stay if you want to. You are all a jealous lot.
If you girls can't have a beau yourselves, you be-
grudge one to me. I never saw such a house as this
for a man to come courting in."

"I will stay," said Eliza, and this time her voice
was wholly firm. "There is no use in my going,
anyway, for the others are coming back."

It was true. Back flitted Jane and Susan, and by
that time Tom Reed had reached the gate, and his cigar
was going out in a shower of sparks on the gravel
walk, and all four sisters were greeting him and
urging upon his acceptance the fifth chair. Annie,
watching, saw that the young man seemed to hesi-
tate. Then her heart leaped and she heard him
speak quite plainly, with a note of defiance and irri-
tation, albeit with embarrassment.

"Is Miss Annie in?" asked Tom Reed.

Imogen answered first, and her harsh voice was
honey-sweet.

"I fear dear Annie is out," she said. "She will
be so sorry to miss you."

Annie, at her window, made a sudden passionate
motion, then she sat still and listened. She argued
fiercely that she was right in so doing. She felt that
the time had come when she must know, for the sake
of her own individuality, just what she had to deal
with in the natures of her own kith and kin. Dear
Annie had turned in her groove of sweetness and
gentle yielding, as all must turn who have any
strength of character underneath the sweetness and
gentleness. Therefore Annie, at her window above,
listened.

At first she heard little that bore upon herself,
for the conversation was desultory, about the weather
and general village topics. Then Annie heard her
own name. She was "dear Annie," as usual. She
listened, fairly faint with amazement. What she
heard from that quartette of treble voices down there
in the moonlight seemed almost like a fairy-tale.
The sisters did not violently incriminate her. They
were too astute for that. They told half-truths.
They told truths which were as shadows of the real
facts, and yet not to be contradicted. They built
up between them a story marvelously consist-
ent, unless prearranged, and that Annie did not
think possible. George Wells figured in the tale,
and there were various hints and pauses concerning
herself and her own character in daily life, and not
one item could be flatly denied, even if the girl could
have gone down there and, standing in the midst
of that moonlit group, given her sisters the lie.

Everything which they told, the whole structure
of falsehood, had beams and rafters of truth. Annie
felt helpless before it all. To her fancy, her sisters
and Tom Reed seemed actually sitting in a fairy
building whose substance was utter falsehood, and
yet which could not be utterly denied. An awful
sense of isolation possessed her. So these were her
own sisters, the sisters whom she had loved as a
matter of the simplest nature, whom she had ad-
mired, whom she had served.

She made no allowance, since she herself was per-
fectly normal, for the motive which underlay it all.
She could not comprehend the strife of the women
over the one man. Tom Reed was in reality the one
desirable match in the village. Annie knew, or
thought she knew, that Tom Reed had it in mind
to love her, and she innocently had it in mind to
love him. She thought of a home of her own and
his with delight. She thought of it as she thought
of the roses coming into bloom in June, and she
thought of it as she thought of the every-day hap-
penings of life -- cooking, setting rooms in order,
washing dishes.  However, there was something
else to reckon with, and that Annie instinctively
knew. She had been long-suffering, and her long-
suffering was now regarded as endless. She had
cast her pearls, and they had been trampled. She
had turned her other cheek, and it had been promptly
slapped. It was entirely true that Annie's sisters
were not quite worthy of her, that they had taken
advantage of her kindness and gentleness, and had
mistaken them for weakness, to be despised. She
did not understand them, nor they her. They
were, on the whole, better than she thought, but
with her there was a stern limit of endurance. Some-
thing whiter and hotter than mere wrath was in the
girl's soul as she sat there and listened to the build-
ing of that structure of essential falsehood about
herself.

She waited until Tom Reed had gone. He did
not stay long. Then she went down-stairs with
flying feet, and stood among them in the moonlight.
Her father had come out of the study, and Benny
had just been entering the gate as Tom Reed left.
Then dear Annie spoke. She really spoke for the
first time in her life, and there was something dread-
ful about it all. A sweet nature is always rather
dreadful when it turns and strikes, and Annie struck
with the whole force of a nature with a foundation
of steel. She left nothing unsaid. She defended
herself and she accused her sisters as if before a
judge. Then came her ultimatum.

"To-morrow morning I am going over to Grand-
mother Loomis's house, and I am going to live there
a whole year," she declared, in a slow, steady voice.
"As you know, I have enough to live on, and -- in
order that no word of mine can be garbled and twisted
as it has been to-night, I speak not at all. Every-
thing which I have to communicate shall be written
in black and white, and signed with my own name,
and black and white cannot lie."

It was Jane who spoke first. "What will people
say?" she whimpered, feebly.

"From what I have heard you all say to-night,
whatever you make them," retorted Annie -- the
Annie who had turned.

Jane gasped. Silas Hempstead stood staring,
quite dumb before the sudden problem. Imogen
alone seemed to have any command whatever of
the situation.

"May I inquire what the butcher and grocer are
going to think, no matter what your own sisters
think and say, when you give your orders in writ-
ing?" she inquired, achieving a jolt from tragedy
to the commonplace.

"That is my concern," replied Annie, yet she
recognized the difficulty of that phase of the situa-
tion. It is just such trifling matters which detract
from the dignity of extreme attitudes toward ex-
istence.  Annie had taken an extreme attitude,
yet here were the butcher and the grocer to reckon
with. How could she communicate with them in
writing without appearing absurd to the verge of
insanity? Yet even that difficulty had a solution.

Annie thought it out after she had gone to bed
that night. She had been imperturbable with her
sisters, who had finally come in a body to make
entreaties, although not apologies or retractions.
There was a stiff-necked strain in the Hempstead
family, and apologies and retractions were bitterer
cuds for them to chew than for most. She had been
imperturbable with her father, who had quoted
Scripture and prayed at her during family worship.
She had been imperturbable even with Benny, who
had whispered to her: "Say, Annie, I don't blame
you, but it will be a hell of a time without you.
Can't you stick it out?"

But she had had a struggle before her own vision
of the butcher and the grocer, and their amazement
when she ceased to speak to them. Then she settled
that with a sudden leap of inspiration. It sounded
too apropos to be life, but there was a little deaf-and-
dumb girl, a far-away relative of the Hempsteads,
who lived with her aunt Felicia in Anderson. She
was a great trial to her aunt Felicia, who was a
widow and well-to-do, and liked the elegancies and
normalities of life.   This unfortunate little Effie
Hempstead could not be placed in a charitable insti-
tution on account of the name she bore. Aunt
Felicia considered it her worldly duty to care for
her, but it was a trial.

Annie would take Effie off Aunt Felicia's hands,
and no comment would be excited by a deaf-and-
dumb girl carrying written messages to the trades-
men, since she obviously could not give them orally.
The only comment would be on Annie's conduct
in holding herself aloof from her family and the
village people generally.

The next morning, when Annie went away, there
was an excited conclave among the sisters.

"She means to do it," said Susan, and she wept.

Imogen's handsome face looked hard and set.
"Let her, if she wants to," said she.

"Only think what people will say!" wailed Jane.

Imogen tossed her head.  "I shall have some-
thing to say myself," she returned. "I shall say how
much we all regret that dear Annie has such a
difficult disposition that she felt she could not live
with her own family and must be alone."

"But," said Jane, blunt in her distress, "will they
believe it?"

"Why will they not believe it, pray?"

"Why, I am afraid people have the impression
that dear Annie has --" Jane hesitated.

"What?" asked Imogen, coldly. She looked very
handsome that morning. Not a waved golden hair
was out of place on her carefully brushed head.
She wore the neatest of blue linen skirts and blouses,
with a linen collar and white tie. There was some-
thing hard but compelling about her blond beauty.

"I am afraid," said Jane, "that people have a
sort of general impression that dear Annie has per-
haps as sweet a disposition as any of us, perhaps
sweeter."

"Nobody says that dear Annie has not a sweet
disposition," said Imogen, taking a careful stitch in
her embroidery. "But a sweet disposition is very
often extremely difficult for other people. It con-
stantly puts them in the wrong. I am well aware of
the fact that dear Annie does a great deal for all
of us, but it is sometimes irritating. Of course
it is quite certain that she must have a feeling
of superiority because of it, and she should not
have it."

Sometimes Eliza made illuminating speeches. "I
suppose it follows, then," said she, with slight irony,
"that only an angel can have a very sweet disposi-
tion without offending others."

But Imogen was not in the least nonplussed.
She finished her line of thought. "And with all her
sweet disposition," said she, "nobody can deny
that dear Annie is peculiar, and peculiarity always
makes people difficult for other people. Of course
it is horribly peculiar what she is proposing to do
now. That in itself will be enough to convince
people that dear Annie must be difficult. Only a
difficult person could do such a strange thing."

"Who is going to get up and get breakfast in the
morning, and wash the dishes?" inquired Jane,
irrelevantly.

"All I ever want for breakfast is a bit of fruit, a
roll, and an egg, besides my coffee," said Imogen,
with her imperious air.

"Somebody has to prepare it."

"That is a mere nothing," said Imogen, and she
took another stitch.

After a little, Jane and Eliza went by themselves
and discussed the problem.

"It is quite evident that Imogen means to do
nothing," said Jane.

"And also that she will justify herself by the
theory that there is nothing to be done," said Eliza.

"Oh, well," said Jane, "I will get up and get
breakfast, of course. I once contemplated the pros-
pect of doing it the rest of my life."

Eliza assented. "I can understand that it will
not be so hard for you," she said, "and although I
myself always aspired to higher things than preparing
breakfasts, still, you did not, and it is true that you
would probably have had it to do if poor Henry
had lived, for he was not one to ever have a very
large salary."

"There are better things than large salaries,"
said Jane, and her face looked sadly reminiscent.
After all, the distinction of being the only one who
had been on the brink of preparing matrimonial
breakfasts was much. She felt that it would make
early rising and early work endurable to her, although
she was not an active young woman.

"I will get a dish-mop and wash the dishes," said
Eliza. "I can manage to have an instructive book
propped open on the kitchen table, and keep my
mind upon higher things as I do such menial tasks."

Then Susan stood in the doorway, a tall figure
gracefully swaying sidewise, long-throated and promi-
nent-eyed. She was the least attractive-looking of
any of the sisters, but her manners were so charming,
and she was so perfectly the lady, that it made up
for any lack of beauty.

"I will dust," said Susan, in a lovely voice, and
as she spoke she involuntarily bent and swirled her
limp muslins in such a way that she fairly suggested
a moral duster. There was the making of an actress
in Susan. Nobody had ever been able to decide what
her true individual self was. Quite unconsciously,
like a chameleon, she took upon herself the charac-
teristics of even inanimate things. Just now she
was a duster, and a wonderfully creditable duster.

"Who," said Jane, "is going to sweep? Dear
Annie has always done that."

"I am not strong enough to sweep. I am very
sorry," said Susan, who remained a duster, and did
not become a broom.

"If we have system," said Eliza, vaguely, "the
work ought not to be so very hard."

"Of course not," said Imogen. She had come in
and seated herself. Her three sisters eyed her, but
she embroidered imperturbably. The same thought
was in the minds of all. Obviously Imogen was the
very one to take the task of sweeping upon herself.
That hard, compact, young body of hers suggested
strenuous household work. Embroidery did not
seem to be her role at all.

But Imogen had no intention of sweeping. Indeed,
the very imagining of such tasks in connection with
herself was beyond her. She did not even dream
that her sisters expected it of her.

"I suppose," said Jane, "that we might be able
to engage Mrs. Moss to come in once a week and
do the sweeping."

"It would cost considerable," said Susan.

"But it has to be done."

"I should think it might be managed, with sys-
tem, if you did not hire anybody," said Imogen,
calmly.

"You talk of system as if it were a suction cleaner,"
said Eliza, with a dash of asperity. Sometimes she
reflected how she would have hated Imogen had
she not been her sister.

"System is invaluable," said Imogen. She looked
away from her embroidery to the white stretch of
country road, arched over with elms, and her beau-
tiful eyes had an expression as if they sighted sys-
tem, the justified settler of all problems.

Meantime, Annie Hempstead was traveling to
Anderson in the jolting trolley-car, and trying to
settle her emotions and her outlook upon life, which
jolted worse than the car upon a strange new track.
She had not the slightest intention of giving up her
plan, but she realized within herself the sensations
of a revolutionist. Who in her family, for generations
and generations, had ever taken the course which
she was taking? She was not exactly frightened
-- Annie had splendid courage when once her blood
was up -- but she was conscious of a tumult and grind
of adjustment to a new level which made her nervous.

She reached the end of the car line, then walked
about half a mile to her Aunt Felicia Hempstead's
house. It was a handsome house, after the standard
of nearly half a century ago. It had an opulent air,
with its swelling breasts of bay windows, through
which showed fine lace curtains; its dormer-windows,
each with its carefully draped curtains; its black-
walnut front door, whose side-lights were screened
with medallioned lace. The house sat high on three
terraces of velvet-like grass, and was surmounted by
stone steps in three instalments, each of which was
flanked by stone lions.

Annie mounted the three tiers of steps between the
stone lions and rang the front-door bell, which was
polished so brightly that it winked at her like a
brazen eye. Almost directly the door was opened
by an immaculate, white-capped and white-aproned
maid, and Annie was ushered into the parlor. When
Annie had been a little thing she had been enamoured
of and impressed by the splendor of this parlor. Now
she had doubts of it, in spite of the long, magnificent
sweep of lace curtains, the sheen of carefully kept
upholstery, the gleam of alabaster statuettes, and
the even piles of gilt-edged books upon the polished
tables.

Soon Mrs. Felicia Hempstead entered, a tall, well-
set-up woman, with a handsome face and keen eyes.
She wore her usual morning costume -- a breakfast
sacque of black silk profusely trimmed with lace,
and a black silk skirt. She kissed Annie, with a
slight peck of closely set lips, for she liked her. Then
she sat down opposite her and regarded her with
as much of a smile as her sternly set mouth could
manage, and inquired politely regarding her health
and that of the family. When Annie broached the
subject of her call, the set calm of her face relaxed,
and she nodded.

"I know what your sisters are. You need not
explain to me," she said.

"But," returned Annie, "I do not think they
realize. It is only because I --"

"Of course," said Felicia Hempstead. "It is be-
cause they need a dose of bitter medicine, and you
hope they will be the better for it. I understand you,
my dear. You have spirit enough, but you don't
get it up often. That is where they make their mis-
take. Often the meek are meek from choice, and
they are the ones to beware of. I don't blame you
for trying it. And you can have Effie and welcome.
I warn you that she is a little wearing. Of course
she can't help her affliction, poor child, but it is
dreadful. I have had her taught. She can read
and write very well now, poor child, and she is not
lacking, and I have kept her well dressed. I take
her out to drive with me every day, and am not
ashamed to have her seen with me. If she had all
her faculties she would not be a bad-looking little
girl. Now, of course, she has something of a vacant
expression. That comes, I suppose, from her not
being able to hear. She has learned to speak a few
words, but I don't encourage her doing that before
people. It is too evident that there is something
wrong. She never gets off one tone. But I will let
her speak to you. She will be glad to go with you.
She likes you, and I dare say you can put up with
her. A woman when she is alone will make a com-
panion of a brazen image. You can manage all right
for everything except her clothes and lessons. I
will pay for them."

"Can't I give her lessons?"

"Well, you can try, but I am afraid you will need
to have Mr. Freer come over once a week. It seems
to me to be quite a knack to teach the deaf and
dumb. You can see. I will have Effie come in and
tell her about the plan. I wanted to go to Europe
this summer, and did not know how to manage
about Effie. It will be a godsend to me, this ar-
rangement, and of course after the year is up she
can come back."

With that Felicia touched a bell, the maid ap-
peared with automatic readiness, and presently a
tall little girl entered. She was very well dressed.
Her linen frock was hand-embroidered, and her shoes
were ultra. Her pretty shock of fair hair was tied
with French ribbon in a fetching bow, and she made
a courtesy which would have befitted a little prin-
cess. Poor Effie's courtesy was the one feature in
which Felicia Hempstead took pride. After making
it the child always glanced at her for approval, and
her face lighted up with pleasure at the faint smile
which her little performance evoked. Effie would
have been a pretty little girl had it not been for that
vacant, bewildered expression of which Felicia had
spoken. It was the expression of one shut up with
the darkest silence of life, that of her own self, and
beauty was incompatible with it.

Felicia placed her stiff forefinger upon her own
lips and nodded, and the child's face became trans-
figured. She spoke in a level, awful voice, utterly
devoid of inflection, and full of fright. Her voice
was as the first attempt of a skater upon ice. How-
ever, it was intelligible.

"Good morning," said she. "I hope you are well."
Then she courtesied again. That little speech and
one other, "Thank you, I am very well," were all
she had mastered. Effie's instruction had begun
rather late, and her teacher was not remarkably
skilful.

When Annie's lips moved in response, Effie's face
fairly glowed with delight and affection. The little
girl loved Annie. Then her questioning eyes sought
Felicia, who beckoned, and drew from the pocket
of her rustling silk skirt a tiny pad and pencil. Effie
crossed the room and stood at attention while Felicia
wrote. When she had read the words on the pad she
gave one look at Annie, then another at Felicia, who
nodded.

Effie courtesied before Annie like a fairy dancer.
"Good morning. I hope you are well," she said.
Then she courtesied again and said, "Thank you,
I am very well."   Her pretty little face was quite
eager with love and pleasure, and yet there was an
effect as of a veil before the happy emotion in it.
The contrast between the awful, level voice and the
grace of motion and evident delight at once shocked
and compelled pity. Annie put her arms around
Effie and kissed her.

"You dear little thing," she said, quite forgetting
that Effie could not hear.

Felicia Hempstead got speedily to work, and soon
Effie's effects were packed and ready for transporta-
tion upon the first express to Lynn Corners, and
Annie and the little girl had boarded the trolley
thither.

Annie Hempstead had the sensation of one who
takes a cold plunge -- half pain and fright, half exhil-
aration and triumph -- when she had fairly taken pos-
session of her grandmother's house. There was gen-
uine girlish pleasure in looking over the stock of
old china and linen and ancient mahoganies, in
starting a fire in the kitchen stove, and preparing
a meal, the written order for which Effie had taken
to the grocer and butcher. There was genuine de-
light in sitting down with Effie at her very own table,
spread with her grandmother's old damask and
pretty dishes, and eating, without hearing a word of
unfavorable comment upon the cookery. But there
was a certain pain and terror in trampling upon that
which it was difficult to define, either her conscience
or sense of the divine right of the conventional.

But that night after Effie had gone to bed, and
the house was set to rights, and she in her cool muslin
was sitting on the front-door step, under the hooded
trellis covered with wistaria, she was conscious of
entire emancipation. She fairly gloated over her
new estate.

"To-night one of the others will really have to
get the supper, and wash the dishes, and not be able
to say she did it and I didn't, when I did," Annie
thought with unholy joy. She knew perfectly well
that her viewpoint was not sanctified, but she felt
that she must allow her soul to have its little witch-
caper or she could not answer for the consequences.
There might result spiritual atrophy, which would
be much more disastrous than sin and repentance.
It was either the continuance of her old life in her
father's house, which was the ignominious and harm-
ful one of the scapegoat, or this. She at last reveled
in this. Here she was mistress. Here what she did,
she did, and what she did not do remained undone.
Here her silence was her invincible weapon. Here
she was free.

The soft summer night enveloped her. The air
was sweet with flowers and the grass which lay still
unraked in her father's yard. A momentary feeling
of impatience seized her; then she dismissed it, and
peace came. What had she to do with that hay?
Her father would be obliged to buy hay if it were not
raked over and dried, but what of that? She had
nothing to do with it.

She heard voices and soft laughter. A dark
shadow passed along the street. Her heart quick-
ened its beat. The shadow turned in at her father's
gate. There was a babel of welcoming voices, of
which Annie could not distinguish one articulate
word. She sat leaning forward, her eyes intent upon
the road. Then she heard the click of her father's gate
and the dark, shadowy figure reappeared in the road.
Annie knew who it was; she knew that Tom Reed
was coming to see her. For a second, rapture seized
her, then dismay. How well she knew her sisters --
how very well! Not one of them would have given
him the slightest inkling of the true situation. They
would have told him, by the sweetest of insinuations,
rather than by straight statements, that she had left
her father's roof and come over here, but not one
word would have been told him concerning her vow
of silence. They would leave that for him to dis-
cover, to his amazement and anger.

Annie rose and fled. She closed the door, turned
the key softly, and ran up-stairs in the dark. Kneel-
ing before a window on the farther side from her old
home, she watched with eager eyes the young man
open the gate and come up the path between the
old-fashioned shrubs. The clove-like fragrance of
the pinks in the border came in her face. Annie
watched Tom Reed disappear beneath the trellised
hood of the door; then the bell tinkled through the
house. It seemed to Annie that she heard it as she
had never heard anything before. Every nerve in her
body seemed urging her to rise and go down-stairs
and admit this young man whom she loved. But
her will, turned upon itself, kept her back. She
could not rise and go down; something stronger
than her own wish restrained her. She suffered
horribly, but she remained. The bell tinkled again.
There was a pause, then it sounded for the third
time.

Annie leaned against the window, faint and trem-
bling. It was rather horrible to continue such a fight
between will and inclination, but she held out. She
would not have been herself had she not done so.
Then she saw Tom Reed's figure emerge from under
the shadow of the door, pass down the path between
the sweet-flowering shrubs, seeming to stir up the
odor of the pinks as he did so. He started to go
down the road; then Annie heard a loud, silvery call,
with a harsh inflection, from her father's house.
"Imogen is calling him back," she thought.

Annie was out of the room, and, slipping softly
down-stairs and out into the yard, crouched close
to the fence overgrown with sweetbrier, its founda-
tion hidden in the mallow, and there she listened.
She wanted to know what Imogen and her other
sisters were about to say to Tom Reed, and she
meant to know. She heard every word. The dis-
tance was not great, and her sisters' voices carried
far, in spite of their honeyed tones and efforts tow-
ard secrecy. By the time Tom had reached the
gate of the parsonage they had all crowded down
there, a fluttering assembly in their snowy summer
muslins, like white doves. Annie heard Imogen first.
Imogen was always the ringleader.

"Couldn't you find her?" asked Imogen.

"No. Rang three times," replied Tom. He had
a boyish voice, and his chagrin showed plainly in it.
Annie knew just how he looked, how dear and big
and foolish, with his handsome, bewildered face,
blurting out to her sisters his disappointment, with
innocent faith in their sympathy.

Then Annie heard Eliza speak in a small, sweet
voice, which yet, to one who understood her, carried in
it a sting of malice. "How very strange!" said Eliza.

Jane spoke next. She echoed Eliza, but her voice
was more emphatic and seemed multiple, as echoes
do. "Yes, very strange indeed," said Jane.

"Dear Annie is really very singular lately.  It
has distressed us all, especially father," said Susan,
but deprecatingly.

Then Imogen spoke, and to the point. "Annie
must be in that house," said she. "She went in
there, and she could not have gone out without our
seeing her."

Annie could fairly see the toss of Imogen's head
as she spoke.

"What in thunder do you all mean?" asked Tom
Reed, and there was a bluntness, almost a brutality,
in his voice which was refreshing.

"I do not think such forcible language is becoming,
especially at the parsonage," said Jane.

Annie distinctly heard Tom Reed snort. "Hang
it if I care whether it is becoming or not," said he.

"You seem to forget that you are addressing
ladies, sir," said Jane.

"Don't forget it for a blessed minute," returned
Tom Reed. "Wish I could. You make it too evi-
dent that you are -- ladies, with every word you
speak, and all your beating about the bush. A man
would blurt it out, and then I would know where
I am at. Hang it if I know now. You all say that
your sister is singular and that she distresses your
father, and you" -- addressing Imogen -- "say that
she must be in that house. You are the only one
who does make a dab at speaking out; I will say
that much for you. Now, if she is in that house,
what in thunder is the matter?"

"I really cannot stay here and listen to such pro-
fane language," said Jane, and she flitted up the path
to the house like an enraged white moth. She had
a fleecy white shawl over her head, and her pale
outline was triangular.

"If she calls that profane, I pity her," said Tom
Reed. He had known the girls since they were
children, and had never liked Jane. He continued,
still addressing Imogen. "For Heaven's sake, if she
is in that house, what is the matter?" said he.
"Doesn't the bell ring? Yes, it does ring, though
it is as cracked as the devil. I heard it. Has Annie
gone deaf? Is she sick? Is she asleep? It is only
eight o'clock. I don't believe she is asleep. Doesn't
she want to see me? Is that the trouble? What
have I done? Is she angry with me?"

Eliza spoke, smoothly and sweetly. "Dear Annie
is singular," said she.

"What the dickens do you mean by singular?
I have known Annie ever since she was that high.
It never struck me that she was any more singular
than other girls, except she stood an awful lot of
nagging without making a kick. Here you all say
she is singular, as if you meant she was" -- Tom
hesitated a second -- "crazy," said he. "Now, I
know that Annie is saner than any girl around here,
and that simply does not go down. What do you
all mean by singular?"

"Dear Annie may not be singular, but her actions
are sometimes singular," said Susan. "We all feel
badly about this."

"You mean her going over to her grandmother's
house to live? I don't know whether I think that
is anything but horse-sense. I have eyes in my
head, and I have used them. Annie has worked
like a dog here; I suppose she needed a rest."

"We all do our share of the work," said Eliza,
calmly, "but we do it in a different way from dear
Annie. She makes very hard work of work. She
has not as much system as we could wish. She tires
herself unnecessarily."

"Yes, that is quite true," assented Imogen.
"Dear Annie gets very tired over the slightest tasks,
whereas if she went a little more slowly and used
more system the work would be accomplished well
and with no fatigue. There are five of us to do the
work here, and the house is very convenient."

There was a silence. Tom Reed was bewildered.
"But -- doesn't she want to see me?" he asked,
finally.

"Dear Annie takes very singular notions some-
times," said Eliza, softly.

"If she took a notion not to go to the door when
she heard the bell ring, she simply wouldn't," said
Imogen, whose bluntness of speech was, after all,
a relief.

"Then you mean that you think she took a notion
not to go to the door?" asked Tom, in a desperate
tone.

"Dear Annie is very singular," said Eliza, with
such softness and deliberation that it was like a
minor chord of music.

"Do you know of anything she has against me?"
asked Tom of Imogen; but Eliza answered for her.

"Dear Annie is not in the habit of making confi-
dantes of her sisters," said she, "but we do know
that she sometimes takes unwarranted dislikes."

"Which time generally cures," said Susan.

"Oh yes," assented Eliza, "which time generally
cures. She can have no reason whatever for avoid-
ing you. You have always treated her well."

"I have always meant to," said Tom, so miserably
and helplessly that Annie, listening, felt her heart
go out to this young man, badgered by females,
and she formed a sudden resolution.

"You have not seen very much of her, anyway,"
said Imogen.

"I have always asked for her, but I understood
she was busy," said Tom, "and that was the reason
why I saw her so seldom."

"Oh," said Eliza, "busy!" She said it with an
indescribable tone.

"If," supplemented Imogen, "there was system,
there would be no need of any one of us being too
busy to see our friends."

"Then she has not been busy? She has not wanted
to see me?" said Tom. "I think I understand at
last. I have been a fool not to before. You girls
have broken it to me as well as you could. Much
obliged, I am sure. Good night."

"Won't you come in?" asked Imogen.

"We might have some music," said Eliza.

"And there is an orange cake, and I will make
coffee," said Susan.

Annie reflected rapidly how she herself had made
that orange cake, and what queer coffee Susan
would be apt to concoct.

"No, thank you," said Tom Reed, briskly. "I
will drop in another evening. Think I must go
home now. I have some important letters. Good
night, all."

Annie made a soft rush to the gate, crouching
low that her sisters might not see her. They flocked
into the house with irascible murmurings, like scold-
ing birds, while Annie stole across the grass, which
had begun to glisten with silver wheels of dew. She
held her skirts closely wrapped around her, and
stepped through a gap in the shrubs beside the walk,
then sped swiftly to the gate. She reached it just
as Tom Reed was passing with a quick stride.

"Tom," said Annie, and the young man stopped
short.

He looked in her direction, but she stood close
to a great snowball-bush, and her dress was green
muslin, and he did not see her. Thinking that he
had been mistaken, he started on, when she called
again, and this time she stepped apart from the bush
and her voice sounded clear as a flute.

"Tom," she said. "Stop a minute, please."

Tom stopped and came close to her. In the dim
light she could see that his face was all aglow, like
a child's, with delight and surprise.

"Is that you, Annie?" he said.

"Yes. I want to speak to you, please."

"I have been here before, and I rang the bell three
times. Then you were out, although your sisters
thought not."

"No, I was in the house."

"You did not hear the bell?"

"Yes, I heard it every time."

"Then why --?"

"Come into the house with me and I will tell you;
at least I will tell you all I can."

Annie led the way and the young man followed.
He stood in the dark entry while Annie lit the parlor
lamp. The room was on the farther side of the
house from the parsonage.

"Come in and sit down," said Annie. Then the
young man stepped into a room which was pretty in
spite of itself. There was an old Brussels carpet
with an enormous rose pattern. The haircloth fur-
niture gave out gleams like black diamonds under
the light of the lamp. In a corner stood a what-not
piled with branches of white coral and shells. Annie's
grandfather had been a sea-captain, and many of
his spoils were in the house. Possibly Annie's own
occupation of it was due to an adventurous strain
inherited from him.  Perhaps the same impulse
which led him to voyage to foreign shores had led
her to voyage across a green yard to the next house.

Tom Reed sat down on the sofa. Annie sat in a
rocking-chair near by. At her side was a Chinese
teapoy, a nest of lacquer tables, and on it stood a
small, squat idol. Annie's grandmother had been
taken to task by her son-in-law, the Reverend Silas,
for harboring a heathen idol, but she had only laughed,

"Guess as long as I don't keep heathen to bow
down before him, he can't do much harm," she had
said.

Now the grotesque face of the thing seemed to
stare at the two Occidental lovers with the strange,
calm sarcasm of the Orient, but they had no eyes
or thought for it.

"Why didn't you come to the door if you heard
the bell ring?" asked Tom Reed, gazing at Annie,
slender as a blade of grass in her clinging green
gown.

"Because I was not able to break my will then.
I had to break it to go out in the yard and ask you
to come in, but when the bell rang I hadn't got to
the point where I could break it."

"What on earth do you mean, Annie?"

Annie laughed. "I don't wonder you ask," she
said, "and the worst of it is I can't half answer you.
I wonder how much, or rather how little explanation
will content you?"

Tom Reed gazed at her with the eyes of a man
who might love a woman and have infinite patience
with her, relegating his lack of understanding of
her woman's nature to the background, as a thing
of no consequence.

"Mighty little will do for me," he said, "mighty
little, Annie dear, if you will only tell a fellow you
love him."

Annie looked at him, and her thin, sweet face
seemed to have a luminous quality, like a crescent
moon. Her look was enough.

"Then you do?" said Tom Reed.

"You have never needed to ask," said Annie.
"You knew."

"I haven't been so sure as you think," said Tom.
"Suppose you come over here and sit beside me.
You look miles away."

Annie laughed and blushed, but she obeyed. She
sat beside Tom and let him put his arm around her.
She sat up straight, by force of her instinctive
maidenliness, but she kissed him back when he
kissed her.

"I haven't been so sure," repeated Tom. "Annie
darling, why have I been unable to see more of you?
I have fairly haunted your house, and seen the whole
lot of your sisters, especially Imogen, but somehow
or other you have been as slippery as an eel. I have
always asked for you, but you were always out or
busy."

"I have been very busy," said Annie, evasively.
She loved this young man with all her heart, but she
had an enduring loyalty to her own flesh and blood.

Tom was very literal. "Say, Annie," he blurted
out, "I begin to think you have had to do most of
the work over there. Now, haven't you? Own up."

Annie laughed sweetly. She was so happy that
no sense of injury could possibly rankle within her.
"Oh, well," she said, lightly. "Perhaps. I don't
know. I guess housekeeping comes rather easier
to me than to the others. I like it, you know, and
work is always easier when one likes it. The other
girls don't take to it so naturally, and they get very
tired, and it has seemed often that I was the one
who could hurry the work through and not mind."

"I wonder if you will stick up for me the way you
do for your sisters when you are my wife?" said
Tom, with a burst of love and admiration. Then
he added: "Of course you are going to be my wife,
Annie? You know what this means?"

"If you think I will make you as good a wife as
you can find," said Annie.

"As good a wife! Annie, do you really know
what you are?"

"Just an ordinary girl, with no special talent for
anything."

"You are the most wonderful girl that ever walked
the earth," exclaimed Tom. "And as for talent,
you have the best talent in the whole world; you
can love people who are not worthy to tie your shoe-
strings, and think you are looking up when in
reality you are looking down. That is what I call
the best talent in the whole world for a woman."
Tom Reed was becoming almost subtle.

Annie only laughed happily again. "Well, you
will have to wait and find out," said she.

"I suppose," said Tom, "that you came over
here because you were tired out, this hot weather.
I think you were sensible, but I don't think you
ought to be here alone."

"I am not alone," replied Annie. "I have poor
little Effie Hempstead with me."

"That deaf-and-dumb child? I should think this
heathen god would be about as much company."

"Why, Tom, she is human, if she is deaf and
dumb."

Tom eyed her shrewdly. "What did you mean
when you said you had broken your will?" he in-
quired.

"My will not to speak for a while," said Annie,
faintly.

"Not to speak -- to any one?"

Annie nodded.

"Then you have broken your resolution by speak-
ing to me?"

Annie nodded again.

"But why shouldn't you speak? I don't under-
stand."

"I wondered how little I could say, and have
you satisfied," Annie replied, sadly.

Tom tightened his arm around her. "You pre-
cious little soul," he said. "I am satisfied. I know
you have some good reason for not wanting to speak,
but I am plaguey glad you spoke to me, for I should
have been pretty well cast down if you hadn't, and
to-morrow I have to go away."

Annie leaned toward him. "Go away!"

"Yes; I have to go to California about that con-
founded Ames will case. And I don't know exactly
where, on the Pacific coast, the parties I have to
interview may be, and I may have to be away weeks,
possibly months. Annie darling, it did seem to me
a cruel state of things to have to go so far, and leave
you here, living in such a queer fashion, and not
know how you felt. Lord! but I'm glad you had
sense enough to call me, Annie."

"I couldn't let you go by, when it came to it,
and Tom --"

"What, dear?"

"I did an awful mean thing: something I never
was guilty of before. I -- listened."

"Well, I don't see what harm it did. You didn't
hear much to your or your sisters' disadvantage,
that I can remember. They kept calling you 'dear.'"

"Yes," said Annie, quickly. Again, such was her
love and thankfulness that a great wave of love and
forgiveness for her sisters swept over her. Annie had
a nature compounded of depths of sweetness; nobody
could be mistaken with regard to that. What they
did mistake was the possibility of even sweetness be-
ing at bay at times, and remaining there.

"You don't mean to speak to anybody else?"
asked Tom.

"Not for a year, if I can avoid it without making
comment which might hurt father."

"Why, dear?"

"That is what I cannot tell you," replied Annie,
looking into his face with a troubled smile.

Tom looked at her in a puzzled way, then he
kissed her.

"Oh, well, dear," he said, "it is all right. I know
perfectly well you would do nothing in which you
were not justified, and you have spoken to me,
anyway, and that is the main thing. I think if I
had been obliged to start to-morrow without a word
from you I shouldn't have cared a hang whether
I ever came back or not. You are the only soul to
hold me here; you know that, darling."

"Yes," replied Annie.

"You are the only one," repeated Tom, "but it
seems to me this minute as if you were a whole host,
you dear little soul. But I don't quite like to leave
you here living alone, except for Effie."

"Oh, I am within a stone's-throw of father's,"
said Annie, lightly.

"I admit that. Still, you are alone. Annie, when
are you going to marry me?"

Annie regarded him with a clear, innocent look.
She had lived such a busy life that her mind was
unfilmed by dreams. "Whenever you like, after you
come home," said she.

"It can't be too soon for me. I want my wife and
I want my home. What will you do while I am
gone, dear?"

Annie laughed. "Oh, I shall do what I have seen
other girls do -- get ready to be married."

"That means sewing, lots of hemming and tucking
and stitching, doesn't it?"

"Of course."

"Girls are so funny," said Tom. "Now imagine a
man sitting right down and sewing like mad on his
collars and neckties and shirts the minute a girl
said she'd marry him!"

"Girls like it."

"Well, I suppose they do," said Tom, and he
looked down at Annie from a tender height of mascu-
linity, and at the same time seemed to look up from
the valley of one who cannot understand the subtle
and poetical details in a woman's soul.

He did not stay long after that, for it was late.
As he passed through the gate, after a tender fare-
well, Annie watched him with shining eyes. She
was now to be all alone, but two things she
had, her freedom and her love, and they would
suffice.

The next morning Silas Hempstead, urged by his
daughters, walked solemnly over to the next house,
but he derived little satisfaction. Annie did not
absolutely refuse to speak. She had begun to realize
that carrying out her resolution to the extreme letter
was impossible. But she said as little as she could.

"I have come over here to live for the present.
I am of age, and have a right to consult my own
wishes. My decision is unalterable." Having said
this much, Annie closed her mouth and said no
more. Silas argued and pleaded. Annie sat placidly
sewing beside one front window of the sunny sitting-
room. Effie, with a bit of fancy-work, sat at another.
Finally Silas went home defeated, with a last word,
half condemnatory, half placative. Silas was not the
sort to stand firm against such feminine strength as
his daughter Annie's. However, he secretly held
her dearer than all his other children.

After her father had gone, Annie sat taking even
stitch after even stitch, but a few tears ran over her
cheeks and fell upon the soft mass of muslin. Effie
watched with shrewd, speculative silence, like a pet
cat. Then suddenly she rose and went close to Annie,
with her little arms around her neck, and the poor
dumb mouth repeating her little speeches: "Thank
you, I am very well, thank you, I am very well,"
over and over.

Annie kissed her fondly, and was aware of a sense
of comfort and of love for this poor little Effie.
Still, after being nearly two months with the child,
she was relieved when Felicia Hempstead came, the
first of September, and wished to take Effie home
with her. She had not gone to Europe, after all, but
to the mountains, and upon her return had missed
the little girl.

Effie went willingly enough, but Annie discovered
that she too missed her. Now loneliness had her
fairly in its grip. She had a telephone installed,
and gave her orders over that. Sometimes the sound
of a human voice made her emotional to tears.
Besides the voices over the telephone, Annie had
nobody, for Benny returned to college soon after
Effie left. Benny had been in the habit of coming in
to see Annie, and she had not had the heart to
check him. She talked to him very little, and knew
that he was no telltale as far as she was concerned,
although he waxed most communicative with regard
to the others. A few days before he left he came
over and begged her to return.

"I know the girls have nagged you till you are
fairly worn out," he said. "I know they don't tell
things straight, but I don't believe they know it,
and I don't see why you can't come home, and insist
upon your rights, and not work so hard."

"If I come home now it will be as it was before,"
said Annie.

"Can't you stand up for yourself and not have
it the same?"

Annie shook her head.

"Seems as if you could," said Benny. "I always
thought a girl knew how to manage other girls. It
is rather awful the way things go now over there.
Father must be uncomfortable enough trying to
eat the stuff they set before him and living in such
a dirty house."

Annie winced. "Is it so very dirty?"

Benny whistled.

"Is the food so bad?"

Benny whistled again.

"You advised me -- or it amounted to the same
thing -- to take this stand," said Annie.

"I know I did, but I didn't know how bad it
would be. Guess I didn't half appreciate you myself,
Annie. Well, you must do as you think best, but
if you could look in over there your heart would
ache."

"My heart aches as it is," said Annie, sadly.

Benny put an arm around her. "Poor girl!" he
said. "It is a shame, but you are going to marry
Tom. You ought not to have the heartache."

"Marriage isn't everything," said Annie, "and
my heart does ache, but -- I can't go back there,
unless -- I can't make it clear to you, Benny, but it
seems to me as if I couldn't go back there until the
year is up, or I shouldn't be myself, and it seems, too,
as if I should not be doing right by the girls. There
are things more important even than doing work for
others. I have got it through my head that I can
be dreadfully selfish being unselfish."

"Well, I suppose you are right," admitted Benny
with a sigh.

Then he kissed Annie and went away, and the
blackness of loneliness settled down upon her. She
had wondered at first that none of the village people
came to see her, although she did not wish to talk to
them; then she no longer wondered. She heard, with-
out hearing, just what her sisters had said about her.

That was a long winter for Annie Hempstead.
Letters did not come very regularly from Tom Reed,
for it was a season of heavy snowfalls and the mails
were often delayed. The letters were all that she
had for comfort and company. She had bought a
canary-bird, adopted a stray kitten, and filled her
sunny windows with plants. She sat beside them
and sewed, and tried to be happy and content, but
all the time there was a frightful uncertainty deep
down within her heart as to whether or not she was
doing right. She knew that her sisters were un-
worthy, and yet her love and longing for them
waxed greater and greater. As for her father, she
loved him as she had never loved him before. The
struggle grew terrible. Many a time she dressed
herself in outdoor array and started to go home,
but something always held her back. It was a
strange conflict that endured through the winter
months, the conflict of a loving, self-effacing heart
with its own instincts.

Toward the last of February her father came over
at dusk. Annie ran to the door, and he entered.
He looked unkempt and dejected. He did not say
much, but sat down and looked about him with a
half-angry, half-discouraged air. Annie went out
into the kitchen and broiled some beefsteak, and
creamed some potatoes, and made tea and toast.
Then she called him into the sitting-room, and he
ate like one famished.

"Your sister Susan does the best she can," he said,
when he had finished, "and lately Jane has been try-
ing, but they don't seem to have the knack. I
don't want to urge you, Annie, but --"

"You know when I am married you will have to
get on without me," Annie said, in a low voice.

"Yes, but in the mean time you might, if you
were home, show Susan and Jane."

"Father," said Annie, "you know if I came home
now it would be just the same as it was before.
You know if I give in and break my word with my-
self to stay away a year what they will think
and do."

"I suppose they might take advantage," admitted
Silas, heavily. "I fear you have always given in
to them too much for their own good."

"Then I shall not give in now," said Annie, and
she shut her mouth tightly.

There came a peal of the cracked door-bell, and
Silas started with a curious, guilty look. Annie
regarded him sharply. "Who is it, father?"

"Well, I heard Imogen say to Eliza that she
thought it was very foolish for them all to stay over
there and have the extra care and expense, when
you were here."

"You mean that the girls --?"

"I think they did have a little idea that they
might come here and make you a little visit --"

Annie was at the front door with a bound. The
key turned in the lock and a bolt shot into place.
Then she returned to her father, and her face was
very white.

"You did not lock your door against your own
sisters?" he gasped.

"God forgive me, I did."

The bell pealed again. Annie stood still, her
mouth quivering in a strange, rigid fashion. The
curtains in the dining-room windows were not drawn.
Suddenly one window showed full of her sisters'
faces. It was Susan who spoke.

"Annie, you can't mean to lock us out?" Susan's
face looked strange and wild, peering in out of the
dark. Imogen's handsome face towered over her
shoulder.

"We think it advisable to close our house and
make you a visit," she said, quite distinctly through
the glass.

Then Jane said, with an inaudible sob, "Dear
Annie, you can't mean to keep us out!"

Annie looked at them and said not a word. Their
half-commanding, half-imploring voices continued
a while. Then the faces disappeared.

Annie turned to her father. "God knows if I
have done right," she said, "but I am doing what
you have taken me to account for not doing."

"Yes, I know," said Silas. He sat for a while
silent. Then he rose, kissed Annie -- something he
had seldom done -- and went home. After he had
gone Annie sat down and cried. She did not go to
bed that night. The cat jumped up in her lap, and
she was glad of that soft, purring comfort. It
seemed to her as if she had committed a great crime,
and as if she had suffered martyrdom. She loved
her father and her sisters with such intensity that
her heart groaned with the weight of pure love. For
the time it seemed to her that she loved them more
than the man whom she was to marry. She sat there
and held herself, as with chains of agony, from rush-
ing out into the night, home to them all, and break-
ing her vow.

It was never quite so bad after that night, for
Annie compromised. She baked bread and cake
and pies, and carried them over after nightfall and
left them at her father's door. She even, later on,
made a pot of coffee, and hurried over with it in the
dawn-light, always watching behind a corner of a
curtain until she saw an arm reached out for it. All
this comforted Annie, and, moreover, the time was
drawing near when she could go home.

Tom Reed had been delayed much longer than
he expected. He would not be home before early
fall. They would not be married until November,
and she would have several months at home first.

At last the day came. Out in Silas Hempstead's
front yard the grass waved tall, dotted with disks
of clover. Benny was home, and he had been over
to see Annie every day since his return. That morn-
ing when Annie looked out of her window the first
thing she saw was Benny waving a scythe in awkward
sweep among the grass and clover. An immense
pity seized her at the sight. She realized that he
was doing this for her, conquering his indolence.
She almost sobbed.

"Dear, dear boy, he will cut himself," she thought.
Then she conquered her own love and pity, even as
her brother was conquering his sloth. She under-
stood clearly that it was better for Benny to go on
with his task even if he did cut himself.

The grass was laid low when she went home, and
Benny stood, a conqueror in a battle-field of summer,
leaning on his scythe.

"Only look, Annie," he cried out, like a child.
"I have cut all the grass."

Annie wanted to hug him. Instead she laughed.
"It was time to cut it," she said. Her tone was cool,
but her eyes were adoring.

Benny laid down his scythe, took her by the arm,
and led her into the house. Silas and his other daugh-
ters were in the sitting-room, and the room was so
orderly it was painful. The ornaments on the man-
tel-shelf stood as regularly as soldiers on parade,
and it was the same with the chairs. Even the cush-
ions on the sofa were arranged with one corner over-
lapping another. The curtains were drawn at ex-
actly the same height from the sill. The carpet
looked as if swept threadbare.

Annie's first feeling was of worried astonishment;
then her eye caught a glimpse of Susan's kitchen
apron tucked under a sofa pillow, and of layers of
dust on the table, and she felt relieved. After all,
what she had done had not completely changed the
sisters, whom she loved, faults and all.  Annie
realized how horrible it would have been to find her
loved ones completely changed, even for the better.
They would have seemed like strange, aloof angels
to her.

They all welcomed her with a slight stiffness, yet
with cordiality. Then Silas made a little speech.

"Your father and your sisters are glad to welcome
you home, dear Annie," he said, "and your sisters
wish me to say for them that they realize that pos-
sibly they may have underestimated your tasks and
overestimated their own. In short, they may not
have been --"

Silas hesitated, and Benny finished. "What the
girls want you to know, Annie, is that they have
found out they have been a parcel of pigs."

"We fear we have been selfish without realizing
it," said Jane, and she kissed Annie, as did Susan
and Eliza. Imogen, looking very handsome in her
blue linen, with her embroidery in her hands, did
not kiss her sister. She was not given to demon-
strations, but she smiled complacently at her.

"We are all very glad to have dear Annie back,
I am sure," said she, "and now that it is all over,
we all feel that it has been for the best, although it
has seemed very singular, and made, I fear, con-
siderable talk. But, of course, when one person in
a family insists upon taking everything upon her-
self, it must result in making the others selfish."

Annie did not hear one word that Imogen said.
She was crying on Susan's shoulder.

"Oh, I am so glad to be home," she sobbed.

And they all stood gathered about her, rejoicing
and fond of her, but she was the one lover among
them all who had been capable of hurting them and
hurting herself for love's sake.





End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Copy-Cat & Other Stories