For two weeks, now, she had been a member of her son John's family—two vain, unprofitable weeks. When before that had the sunset found her night after night with hands limp from a long day of idleness? When before that had the sunrise found her morning after morning with a mind destitute of worthy aim or helpful plan for the coming twelve hours? When, indeed?

Not in her girlhood, not even in her childhood, had there been days of such utter uselessness—rag dolls and mud pies need some care! As for her married life, there were Eben, the babies, the house, the church—and how absolutely necessary she had been to each one!

The babies had quickly grown to stalwart men and sweet-faced women who had as quickly left the home nest and built new nests of their own. Eben had died; and the church—strange how long and longer still the walk to the church had grown each time she had walked it this last year! After all, perhaps it did not matter; there were new faces at the church, and young, strong hands that did not falter and tremble over these new ways of doing things. For a time there had been only the house that needed her—but how great that need had been! There were the rooms to care for, there was the linen to air, there were the dear treasures of picture and toy to cry and laugh over; and outside there were the roses to train and the pansies to pick.

Now, even the house was not left. It was October, and son John had told her that winter was coming on and she must not remain alone. He had brought her to his own great house and placed her in these beautiful rooms—indeed, son John was most kind to her! If only she could make some return, do something, be of some use!

Her heart failed her as she thought of the grave-faced, preoccupied man who came each morning into the room with the question, "Well, mother, is there anything you need to-day?" What possible service could she render him? Her heart failed her again as she thought of John's pretty, new wife, and of the two big boys, men grown, sons of dear dead Molly. There was the baby, to be sure; but the baby was always attended by one, and maybe two, white-capped, white-aproned young women. Madam Wetherby never felt quite sure of herself when with those young women. There were other young women, too, in whose presence she felt equally ill at ease; young women in still prettier white aprons and still daintier white caps; young women who moved noiselessly in and out of the halls and parlors and who waited at table each day.

Was there not some spot, some creature, some thing, in all that place that needed the touch of her hand, the glance of her eye? Surely the day had not quite come when she could be of no use, no service to her kind! Her work must be waiting; she had only to find it. She would seek it out—and that at once. No more of this slothful waiting for the work to come to her! "Indeed, no!" she finished aloud, her dim eyes alight, her breath coming short and quick, and her whole frail self quivering with courage and excitement.

It was scarcely nine o'clock the next morning when a quaint little figure in a huge gingham apron (slyly abstracted from the bottom of a trunk) slipped out of the rooms given over to the use of John Wetherby's mother. The little figure tripped softly, almost stealthily, along the hall and down the wide main staircase. There was some hesitation and there were a few false moves before the rear stairway leading to the kitchen was gained; and there was a gasp, half triumphant, half dismayed, when the kitchen was reached.

The cook stared, open-mouthed, as though confronted with an apparition. A maid, hurrying across the room with a loaded tray, almost dropped her burden to the floor. There was a dazed moment of silence, then Madam Wetherby took a faltering step forward and spoke.

"Good-morning! I—I've come to help you."

"Ma'am!" gasped the cook.

"To help—to help!" nodded the little old lady briskly, with a sudden overwhelming joy at the near prospect of the realization of her hopes. "Pare apples, beat eggs, or—anything!"

"Indeed, ma'am, I—you—" The cook stopped helplessly, and eyed with frightened fascination the little old lady as she crossed to the table and picked up a pan of potatoes.

"Now a knife, please,—oh, here's one," continued Madam Wetherby happily. "Go right about something else. I'll sit over there in that chair, and I'll have these peeled very soon."

When John Wetherby visited his mother's rooms that morning he found no one there to greet him. A few sharp inquiries disclosed the little lady's whereabouts and sent Margaret Wetherby with flaming cheeks and tightening lips into the kitchen.

"Mother!" she cried; and at the word the knife dropped from the trembling, withered old fingers and clattered to the floor. "Why, mother!"

"I—I was helping," quavered a deprecatory voice.

Something in the appealing eyes sent a softer curve to Margaret Wetherby's lips.

"Yes, mother; that was very kind of you," said John's wife gently. "But such work is quite too hard for you, and there's no need of your doing it. Nora will finish these," she added, lifting the pan of potatoes to the table, "and you and I will go upstairs to your room. Perhaps we'll go driving by and by. Who knows?"

In thinking it over afterwards Nancy Wetherby could find no fault with her daughter-in-law. Margaret had been goodness itself, insisting only that such work was not for a moment to be thought of. John's wife was indeed kind, acknowledged Madam Wetherby to herself, yet two big tears welled to her eyes and were still moist on her cheeks after she had fallen asleep.

It was perhaps three days later that John Wetherby's mother climbed the long flight of stairs near her sitting-room door, and somewhat timidly entered one of the airy, sunlit rooms devoted to Master Philip Wetherby. The young woman in attendance respectfully acknowledged her greeting, and Madam Wetherby advanced with some show of courage to the middle of the room.

"The baby, I—I heard him cry," she faltered.

"Yes, madam," smiled the nurse. "It is Master Philip's nap hour."

Louder and louder swelled the wails from the inner room, yet the nurse did not stir save to reach for her thread.

"But he's crying—yet!" gasped Madam Wetherby.

The girl's lips twitched and an expression came to her face which the little old lady did not in the least understand.

"Can't you—do something?" demanded baby's grandmother, her voice shaking.

"No, madam. I—" began the girl, but she did not finish. The little figure before her drew itself to the full extent of its diminutive height.

"Well, I can," said Madam Wetherby crisply. Then she turned and hurried into the inner room.

The nurse sat mute and motionless until a crooning lullaby and the unmistakable tapping of rockers on a bare floor brought her to her feet in dismay. With an angry frown she strode across the room, but she stopped short at the sight that met her eyes.

In a low chair, her face aglow with the accumulated love of years of baby-brooding, sat the little old lady, one knotted, wrinkled finger tightly elapsed within a dimpled fist. The cries had dropped to sobbing breaths, and the lullaby, feeble and quavering though it was, rose and swelled triumphant. The anger fled from the girl's face, and a queer choking came to her throat so that her words were faint and broken.

"Madam—I beg pardon—I'm sorry, but I must put Master Philip back on his bed."

"But he isn't asleep yet," demurred Madam Wetherby softly, her eyes mutinous.

"But you must—I can't—that is, Master Philip cannot be rocked," faltered the girl.

"Nonsense, my dear!" she said; "babies can always be rocked!" And again the lullaby rose on the air.

"But, madam," persisted the girl—she was almost crying now—"don't you see? I must put Master Philip back. It is Mrs. Wetherby's orders. They— they don't rock babies so much now."

For an instant fierce rebellion spoke through flashing eyes, stern-set lips, and tightly clutched fingers; then all the light died from the thin old face and the tense muscles relaxed.

"You may put the baby back," said Madam Wetherby tremulously, yet with a sudden dignity that set the maid to curtsying. "I—I should not want to cross my daughter's wishes."

Nancy Wetherby never rocked her grandson again, but for days she haunted the nursery, happy if she could but tie the baby's moccasins or hold his brush or powder-puff; yet a week had scarcely passed when John's wife said to her:

"Mother, dear, I wouldn't tire myself so trotting upstairs each day to the nursery. There isn't a bit of need—Mary and Betty can manage quite well. You fatigue yourself too much!" And to the old lady's denials John's wife returned, with a tinge of sharpness: "But, really, mother, I'd rather you didn't. It frets the nurses and—forgive me-but you know you will forget and talk to him in 'baby-talk'!"

The days came and the days went, and Nancy Wetherby stayed more and more closely to her rooms. She begged one day for the mending-basket, but her daughter-in-law laughed and kissed her.

"Tut, tut, mother, dear!" she remonstrated. "As if I'd have you wearing your eyes and fingers out mending a paltry pair of socks!"

"Then I—I'll knit new ones!" cried the old lady, with sudden inspiration.

"Knit new ones—stockings!" laughed Margaret Wetherby. "Why, dearie, they never in this world would wear them—and if they would, I couldn't let you do it," she added gently, as she noted the swift clouding of the eager face. "Such tiresome work!"

Again the old eyes filled with tears; and yet—John's wife was kind, so very kind!

It was a cheerless, gray December morning that John Wetherby came into his mother's room and found a sob-shaken little figure in the depths of the sumptuous, satin-damask chair. "Mother, mother,—why, mother!" There were amazement and real distress in John Wetherby's voice.

"There, there, John, I—I didn't mean to—truly I didn't!" quavered the little old lady.

John dropped on one knee and caught the fluttering fingers. "Mother, what is it?"

"It—it isn't anything; truly it isn't," urged the tremulous voice.

"Is any one unkind to you?" John's eyes grew stern. "The boys, or— Margaret?"

The indignant red mounted to the faded cheek. "John! How can you ask? Every one is kind, kind, so very kind to me!"

"Well, then, what is it?"

There was only a sob in reply. "Come, come," he coaxed gently.

For a moment Nancy Wetherby's breath was held suspended, then it came in a burst with a rush of words.

"Oh, John, John, I'm so useless, so useless, so dreadfully useless! Don't you see? Not a thing, not a person needs me. The kitchen has the cook and the maids. The baby has two or three nurses. Not even this room needs me—there's a girl to dust it each day. Once I slipped out of bed and did it first—I did, John; but she came in, and when I told her, she just curtsied and smiled and kept right on, and—she didn't even skip one chair! John, dear John, sometimes it seems as though even my own self doesn't need me. I—I don't even put on my clothes alone; there's always some one to help me!"

"There, there, dear," soothed the man huskily. "I need you, indeed I do, mother." And he pressed his lips to one, then the other, of the wrinkled, soft-skinned hands.

"You don't—you don't!" choked the woman. "There's not one thing I can do for you! Why, John, only think, I sit with idle hands all day, and there was so much once for them to do. There was Eben, and the children, and the house, and the missionary meetings, and—"

On and on went the sweet old voice, but the man scarcely heard. Only one phrase rang over and over in his ears, "There's not one thing I can do for you!" All the interests of now—stocks, bonds, railroads—fell from his mind and left it blank save for the past. He was a boy again at his mother's knee. And what had she done for him then? Surely among all the myriad things there must be one that he might single out and ask her to do for him now! And yet, as he thought, his heart misgave him.

There were pies baked, clothes made, bumped foreheads bathed, lost pencils found; there were—a sudden vision came to him of something warm and red and very soft—something over which his boyish heart had exulted. The next moment his face lighted with joy very like that of the years long ago.

"Mother!" he cried. "I know what you can do for me. I want a pair of wristers—red ones, just like those you used to knit!"

* * * * *

It must have been a month later that John Wetherby, with his two elder sons, turned the first corner that carried him out of sight of his house. Very slowly, and with gentle fingers, he pulled off two bright red wristers. He folded them, patted them, then tucked them away in an inner pocket.

"Bless her dear heart!" he said softly. "You should have seen her eyes shine when I put them on this morning!"

"I can imagine it," said one of his sons in a curiously tender voice. The other one smiled, and said whimsically, "I can hardly wait for mine!" Yet even as he spoke his eyes grew dim with a sudden moisture.

Back at the house John's mother was saying to John's wife: "Did you see them on him, Margaret?—John's wristers? They did look so bright and pretty! And I'm to make more, too; did you know? Frank and Edward want some; John said so. He told them about his, and they wanted some right away. Only think, Margaret," she finished, lifting with both hands the ball of red worsted and pressing it close to her cheek, "I've got two whole pairs to make now!"



The Giving Thanks of Cyrus and Huldah



For two months Cyrus Gregg and his wife Huldah had not spoken to each other, yet all the while they had lived under the same roof, driven to church side by side, and attended various festivities and church prayer- meetings together.

The cause of the quarrel had been an insignificant something that speedily lost itself in the torrent of angry words that burst from the lips of the irate husband and wife, until by night it would have been difficult for either the man or the woman to tell exactly what had been the first point of difference. By that time, however, the quarrel had assumed such proportions that it loomed in their lives larger than anything else; and each had vowed never to speak to the other until that other had made the advance.

On both sides they came of a stubborn race, and from the first it was a battle royally fought. The night of the quarrel Cyrus betook himself in solitary state to the "spare-room" over the parlor. After that he slept on a makeshift bed that he had prepared for himself in the shed-chamber, hitherto sacred to trunks, dried corn, and cobwebs.

For a month the two sat opposite to each other and partook of Huldah's excellent cooking; then one day the woman found at her plate a piece—of brown paper on which had been scrawled:

If I ain't worth speakin' to I ain't worth cookin' for. Hereafter I'll take care of myself.

A day later came the retort. Cyrus found it tucked under the shed- chamber door.

Huldah's note showed her "schooling." It was well written, carefully spelled, and enclosed in a square white envelope.

Sir [it ran stiffly]: I shall be obliged if you do not chop any more wood for me. Hereafter I shall use the oil stove. HULDAH PENDLETON GREGG.

Cyrus choked, and peered at the name with suddenly blurred eyes: the "Huldah Pendleton" was fiercely black and distinct; the "Gregg" was so faint it could scarcely be discerned.

"Why, it's 'most like a d'vorce!" he shivered.

If it had not been so pitiful, it would have been ludicrous—what followed. Day after day, in one corner of the kitchen, an old man boiled his potatoes and fried his unappetizing eggs over a dusty, unblacked stove; in the other corner an old woman baked and brewed over a shining idol of brass and black enamel—and always the baking and brewing carried to the nostrils of the hungry man across the room the aroma of some dainty that was a particular favorite of his own.

The man whistled, and the woman hummed—at times; but they did not talk, except when some neighbor came in; and then they both talked very loud and very fast—to the neighbor. On this one point were Cyrus Gregg and his wife Huldah agreed; under no circumstances whatever must any gossiping outsider know.

One by one the weeks had passed. It was November now, and very cold. Outdoors a dull gray sky and a dull brown earth combined into a dismal hopelessness. Indoors the dull monotony of a two-months-old quarrel and a growing heartache made a combination that carried even less of cheer.

Huldah never hummed now, and Cyrus seldom whistled; yet neither was one whit nearer speaking. Each saw this, and, curiously enough, was pleased. In fact, it was just here that, in spite of the heartache, each found an odd satisfaction.

"By sugar—but she's a spunky one!" Cyrus would chuckle admiringly, as he discovered some new evidence of his wife's shrewdness in obtaining what she wanted with yet no spoken word.

"There isn't another man in town who could do it—and stick to it!" exulted Huldah proudly, her eyes on her husband's form, bent over his egg-frying at the other side of the room.

Not only the cause of the quarrel, but almost the quarrel itself, had now long since been forgotten; in fact, to both Cyrus and his wife it had come to be a sort of game in which each player watched the other's progress with fully as much interest as he did his own. And yet, with it all there was the heartache; for the question came to them at times with sickening force—just when and how could it possibly end?

It was at about this time that each began to worry about the other. Huldah shuddered at the changeless fried eggs and boiled potatoes; and Cyrus ordered a heavy storm window for the room where Huldah slept alone. Huldah slyly left a new apple pie almost under her husband's nose one day, and Cyrus slipped a five-dollar bill beneath his wife's napkin ring. When both pie and greenback remained untouched, Huldah cried, and Cyrus said, "Gosh darn it!" three times in succession behind the woodshed door.

A week before Thanksgiving a letter came from the married daughter, and another from the married son. They were good letters, kind and loving; and each closed with a suggestion that all go home at Thanksgiving for a family reunion.

Huldah read the letters eagerly, but at their close she frowned and looked anxious. In a moment she had passed them to Cyrus with a toss of her head. Five minutes later Cyrus had flung them back with these words trailing across one of the envelopes:

Write um. Tell um we are sick—dead—gone away—anything! Only don't let um come. A if we wanted to Thanksgive!

Huldah answered the letters that night. She, too, wrote kindly and lovingly; but at the end she said that much as she and father would like to see them, it did not seem wise to undertake to entertain such a family gathering just now. It would be better to postpone it.

Both Huldah and Cyrus hoped that this would end the subject of Thanksgiving; but it did not. The very next day Cyrus encountered neighbor Wiley in the village store. Wiley's round red face shone like the full moon.

"Well, well, Cy, what ye doin' down your way Thanksgivin'—eh?" he queried.

Cyrus stiffened; but before he could answer he discovered that Wiley had asked the question, not for information, but as a mere introduction to a recital of his own plans.

"We're doin' great things," announced the man. "Sam an' Jennie an' the hull kit on 'em's comin' home an' bring all the chicks. Tell ye what, Cy, we be a-Thanksgivin' this year! Ain't nothin' like a good old fam'ly reunion, when ye come right down to it."

"Yes, I know," said Cyrus gloomily. "But we—we ain't doin' much this year."

A day later came Huldah's turn. She had taken some calf's-foot jelly to Mrs. Taylor in the little house at the foot of the hill. The Widow Taylor was crying.

"You see, it's Thanksgiving!" she sobbed, in answer to Huldah's dismayed questions.

"Thanksgiving!"

"Yes. And last year I had—him!"

Huldah sighed, and murmured something comforting, appropriate; but almost at once she stopped, for the woman had turned searching eyes upon her.

"Huldah Gregg, do you appreciate Cyrus?"

Huldah bridled angrily, but there was no time for a reply, for the woman answered her own question, and hurried on wildly.

"No. Did I appreciate my husband? No. Does Sally Clark appreciate her husband? No. And there don't none of us do it till he's gone—gone— gone!"

As soon as possible Huldah went home. She was not a little disconcerted. The "gone—gone—gone" rang unpleasantly in her ears, and before her eyes rose a hateful vision of unappetizing fried eggs and boiled potatoes. As to her not appreciating Cyrus—that was all nonsense; she had always appreciated him, and that, too, far beyond his just deserts, she told herself angrily.

There was no escaping Thanksgiving after that for either Huldah or Cyrus. It looked from every eager eye, and dropped from every joyous lip, until, of all the world Huldah and Cyrus came to regard themselves as the most forlorn, and the most abused.

It was then that to Huldah came her great idea; she would cook for Cyrus the best Thanksgiving dinner he had ever eaten. Just because he was obstinate was no reason why he should starve, she told herself; and very gayly she set about carrying out her plans. First the oil stove, with the help of a jobman, was removed to the unfinished room over the kitchen, for the chief charm of the dinner was to be its secret preparation. Then, with the treasured butter-and-egg money the turkey, cranberries, nuts, and raisins were bought and smuggled into the house and upstairs to the chamber of mystery.

Two days before Thanksgiving Cyrus came home to find a silent and almost empty kitchen. His heart skipped a beat and his jaw fell open in frightened amazement; then a step on the floor above sent the blood back to his face and a new bitterness to his heart.

"So I ain't even good enough ter stay with!" he muttered. "Fool!—fool!" he snarled, glaring at the oblong brown paper in his arms. "As if she'd care for this—now!" he finished, flinging the parcel into the farthest corner of the room.

Unhappy Cyrus! To him, also, had come a great idea. Thanksgiving was not Christmas, to be sure, but if he chose to give presents on that day, surely it was no one's business but his own, he argued. In the brown paper parcel at that moment lay the soft, shimmering folds of yards upon yards of black silk—and Huldah had been longing for a new black silk gown. Yet it was almost dark when Cyrus stumbled over to the corner, picked up the parcel, and carried it ruefully away to the shed-chamber.

Thanksgiving dawned clear and unusually warm. The sun shone, and the air felt like spring. The sparrows twittered in the treetops as if the branches were green with leaves.

To Cyrus, however, it was a world of gloom. Upstairs Huldah was singing— singing!—and it was Thanksgiving. He could hear her feet patter, patter on the floor above, and the sound had a cheery self-reliance that was maddening. Huldah was happy, evidently—and it was Thanksgiving! Twice he had walked resolutely to the back stairs with a brown-paper parcel in his arms; and twice a quavering song of triumph from the room above had sent him back in defeat. As if she could care for a present of his!

Suddenly, now, Cyrus sprang forward in his chair, sniffing the air hungrily. Turkey! Huldah was roasting turkey, while he—

The old man dropped back in his seat and turned his eyes disconsolately on the ill-kept stove—fried eggs and boiled potatoes are not the most toothsome prospect for a Thanksgiving dinner, particularly when one has the smell of a New England housewife's turkey in one's nostrils.

For a time Cyrus sat motionless; then he rose to his feet, shuffled out of the house, and across the road to the barn.

In the room above the kitchen, at that moment, something happened. Perhaps the old hands slipped in their eagerness, or perhaps the old eyes judged a distance wrongly. Whatever it was, there came a puff of smoke, a sputter, and a flare of light; then red-yellow flames leaped to the flimsy shade at the window, and swept on to the century-seasoned timbers above.

With a choking cry, Huldah turned and stumbled across the room to the stairway. Out at the barn door Cyrus, too, saw the flare of light at the window, and he, too, turned with a choking cry.

They met at the foot of the stairway.

"Huldah!"

"Cyrus!"

It was as if one voice had spoken, so exactly were the words simultaneous. Then Cyrus cried:

"You ain't hurt?"

"No, no! Quick—the things—we must get them out!"

Obediently Cyrus turned and began to work; and the first thing that his arms tenderly bore to safety was an oblong brown-paper parcel.

From all directions then came the neighbors running. The farming settlement was miles from a town or a fire-engine. The house was small, and stood quite by itself; and there was little, after all, that could be done, except to save the household goods and gods. This was soon accomplished, and there was nothing to do but to watch the old house burn.

Cyrus and Huldah sat hand in hand on an old stone wall, quite apart from their sympathetic neighbors, and—talked. And about them was a curious air of elation, a buoyancy as if long-pent forces had suddenly found a joyous escape.

"'T ain't as if our things wan't all out," cried Cyrus; his voice was actually exultant.

"Or as if we hadn't wanted to build a new one for years," chirruped his wife.

"Now you can have that 'ere closet under the front stairs, Huldah!"

"And you can have the room for your tools where it'll be warm in the winter!"

"An' there'll be the bow-winder out of the settin' room, Huldah!"

"Yes, and a real bathroom, with water coming right out of the wall, same as the Wileys have!"

"An' a tub, Huldah—one o' them pretty white chiny ones!"

"Oh, Cyrus, ain't it almost too good to be true!" sighed Huldah: then her face changed. "Why, Cyrus, it's gone," she cried with sudden sharpness.

"What's gone?"

"Your dinner—I was cooking such a beautiful turkey and all the fixings for you."

A dull red came into the man's face.

"For—me?" stammered Cyrus.

"Y-yes," faltered Huldah; then her chin came up defiantly.

The man laughed; and there was a boyish ring to his voice.

"Well, Huldah, I didn't have any turkey, but I did have a tidy little piece o' black silk for yer gown, an' I saved it, too. Mebbe we could eat that!—eh?"

It was not until just as they were falling asleep that night in Deacon Clark's spare bedroom that Mr. and Mrs. Gregg so much as hinted that there ever had been a quarrel.

Then, under cover of the dark, Cyrus stammered:

"Huldah, did ye sense it? Them 'ere words we said at the foot of the stairs was spoke—exactly—together!"

"Yes, I know, dear," murmured Huldah, with a little break in her voice. Then:

"Cyrus, ain't it wonderful—this Thanksgiving, for us?"

Downstairs the Clarks were talking of poor old Mr. and Mrs. Gregg and their "sad loss;" but the Clarks did not—know.



A New England Idol



The Hapgood twins were born in the great square house that set back from the road just on the outskirts of Fairtown. Their baby eyes had opened upon a world of faded portraits and somber haircloth furniture, and their baby hands had eagerly clutched at crystal pendants on brass candlesticks gleaming out of the sacred darkness that enveloped the parlor mantel.

When older grown they had played dolls in the wonderful attic, and made mud pies in the wilderness of a back yard. The garden had been a fairyland of delight to their toddling feet, and the apple trees a fragrant shelter for their first attempts at housekeeping.

From babyhood to girlhood the charm of the old place grew upon them, so much so that the thought of leaving it for homes of their own became distasteful to them, and they looked with scant favor upon the occasional village youths who sauntered up the path presumably on courtship bent.

The Reverend John Hapgood—a man who ruled himself and all about him with the iron rod of a rigid old-school orthodoxy—died when the twins were twenty; and the frail little woman who, as his wife, had for thirty years lived and moved solely because he expected breath and motion of her, followed soon in his footsteps. And then the twins were left alone in the great square house on the hill.

Miss Tabitha and Miss Rachel were not the only children of the family. There had been a son—the first born, and four years their senior. The headstrong boy and the iron rule had clashed, and the boy, when sixteen years old, had fled, leaving no trace behind him.

If the Reverend John Hapgood grieved for his wayward son the members of his household knew it not, save as they might place their own constructions on the added sternness to his eyes and the deepening lines about his mouth. "Paul," when it designated the graceless runaway, was a forbidden word in the family, and even the Epistles in the sacred Book, bearing the prohibited name, came to be avoided by the head of the house in the daily readings. It was still music in the hearts of the women, however, though it never passed their lips; and when the little mother lay dying she remembered and spoke of her boy. The habit of years still fettered her tongue and kept it from uttering the name.

"If—he—comes—you know—if he comes, be kind—be good," she murmured, her breath short and labored. "Don't—punish," she whispered—he was yet a lad in her disordered vision. "Don't punish—forgive!"

Years had passed since then—years of peaceful mornings and placid afternoons, and Paul had never appeared. Each purpling of the lilacs in the spring and reddening of the apples in the fall took on new shades of loveliness in the fond eyes of the twins, and every blade of grass and tiny shrub became sacred to them.

On the 10th of June, their thirty-fifth birthday, the place never had looked so lovely. A small table laid with spotless linen and gleaming silver stood beneath the largest apple-tree, a mute witness that the ladies were about to celebrate their birthday—the 10th of June being the only day that the solemn dignity of the dining-room was deserted for the frivolous freedom of the lawn.

Rachel came out of the house and sniffed the air joyfully.

"Delicious!" she murmured. "Somehow, the 10th of June is specially fine every year."

In careful, uplifted hands she bore a round frosted cake, always the chief treasure of the birthday feast. The cake was covered with the tiny colored candies so dear to the heart of a child. Miss Rachel always bought those candies at the village store, with the apology:—

"I want them for Tabitha's birthday cake, you know. She thinks so much of pretty things."

Tabitha invariably made the cake and iced it, and as she dropped the bits of colored sugar into place, she would explain to Huldy, who occasionally "helped" in the kitchen:—

"I wouldn't miss the candy for the world—my sister thinks so much of it!"

So each deceived herself with this pleasant bit of fiction, and yet had what she herself most wanted.

Rachel carefully placed the cake in the center of the table, feasted her eyes on its toothsome loveliness, then turned and hurried back to the house. The door had scarcely shut behind her when a small, ragged urchin darted in at the street gate, snatched the cake, and, at a sudden sound from the house, dashed out of sight behind a shrub close by.

The sound that had frightened the boy was the tapping of the heels of Miss Tabitha's shoes along the back porch. The lady descended the steps, crossed the lawn and placed a saucer of pickles and a plate of dainty sandwiches on the table.

"Why, I thought Rachel brought the cake," she said aloud. "It must be in the house; there's other things to get, anyway. I'll go back."

Again the click of the door brought the small boy close to the table. Filling both hands with sandwiches, he slipped behind the shrub just as the ladies came out of the house together. Rachel carried a small tray laden with sauce and tarts; Tabitha, one with water and steaming tea. As they neared the table each almost dropped her burden.

"Why, where's my cake?"

"And my sandwiches?"

"There's the plate it was on!" Rachel's voice was growing in terror.

"And mine, too!" cried Tabitha, with distended eyes fastened on some bits of bread and meat—all that the small brown hands had left.

"It's burglars—robbers!" Rachel looked furtively over her shoulder.

"And all your lovely cake!" almost sobbed Tabitha.

"It—it was yours, too," said the other with a catch in her voice. "Oh, dear! What can have happened to it? I never heard of such a thing—right in broad daylight!" The sisters had long ago set their trays upon the ground and were now wringing their hands helplessly. Suddenly a small figure appeared before them holding out four sadly crushed sandwiches and half of a crumbling cake.

"I'm sorry—awful sorry! I didn't think—I was so hungry. I'm afraid there ain't very much left," he added, with rueful eyes on the sandwiches.

"No, I should say not!" vouchsafed Rachel, her voice firm now that the size of the "burglar" was declared. Tabitha only gasped.

The small boy placed the food upon the empty plates, and Rachel's lips twitched as she saw that he clumsily tried to arrange it in an orderly fashion.

"There, ma'am,—that looks pretty good!" he finally announced with some pride.

Tabitha made an involuntary gesture of aversion. Rachel laughed outright; then her face grew suddenly stern.

"Boy, what do you mean by such actions?" she demanded.

His eyes fell, and his cheeks showed red through the tan.

"I was hungry."

"But didn't you know it was stealing?" she asked, her face softening.

"I didn't stop to think—it looked so good I couldn't help takin' it." He dug his bare toes in the grass for a moment in silence, then he raised his head with a jerk and stood squarely on both feet. "I hain't got any money, but I'll work to pay for it—bringin' wood in, or somethin'."

"The dear child!" murmured two voices softly.

"I've got to find my folks, sometime, but I'll do the work first. Mebbe an hour'll pay for it—'most!"—He looked hopefully into Miss Rachel's face.

"Who are your folks?" she asked huskily.

By way of answer he handed out a soiled, crumpled envelope for her inspection on which was written, "Reverend John Hapgood."

"Why—it's father!"

"What!" exclaimed Tabitha.

Her sister tore the note open with shaking fingers.

"It's from—Paul!" she breathed, hesitating a conscientious moment over the name. Then she turned her startled eyes on the boy, who was regarding her with lively interest.

"Do I belong to you?" he asked anxiously.

"I—I don't know. Who are you—what's your name?"

"Ralph Hapgood."

Tabitha had caught up the note and was devouring it with swift-moving eyes.

"It's Paul's boy, Rachel," she broke in, "only think of it—Paul's boy!" and she dropped the bit of paper and enveloped the lad in a fond but tearful embrace.

He squirmed uneasily.

"I'm sorry I eat up my own folks's things. I'll go to work any time," he suggested, trying to draw away, and wiping a tear splash from the back of his hand on his trousers.

But it was long hours before Ralph Hapgood was allowed to "go to work." Tears, kisses, embraces, questions, a bath, and clean clothes followed each other in quick succession—the clothes being some of his own father's boyhood garments.

His story was quickly told. His mother was long since dead, and his father had written on his dying bed the letter that commended the boy— so soon to be orphaned—to the pity and care of his grandparents. The sisters trembled and changed color at the story of the boy's hardships on the way to Fairtown; and they plied him with questions and sandwiches in about equal proportions after he told of the frequent dinnerless days and supperless nights of the journey.

That evening when the boy was safe in bed—clean, full-stomached, and sleepily content the sisters talked it over. The Reverend John Hapgood, in his will, had cut off his recreant son with the proverbial shilling, so, by law, there was little coming to Ralph. This, however, the sisters overlooked in calm disdain.

"We must keep him, anyhow," said Rachel with decision.

"Yes, indeed,—the dear child!"

"He's twelve, for all he's so small, but he hasn't had much schooling. We must see to that—we want him well educated," continued Rachel, a pink spot showing in either cheek.

"Indeed we do—we'll send him to college! I wonder, now, wouldn't he like to be a doctor?"

"Perhaps," admitted the other cautiously, "or a minister."

"Sure enough—he might like that better; I'm going to ask him!" and she sprang to her feet and tripped across the room to the parlor-bedroom door. "Ralph," she called softly, after turning the knob, "are you asleep?"

"Huh? N-no, ma'am." The voice nearly gave the lie to the words.

"Well, dear, we were wondering—would you rather be a minister or a doctor?" she asked, much as though she were offering for choice a peach and a pear.

"A doctor!" came emphatically from out of the dark—there was no sleep in the voice now. "I've always wanted to be a doctor."

"You shall, oh, you shall!" promised the woman ecstatically, going back to her sister; and from that time all their lives were ordered with that one end in view.

The Hapgood twins were far from wealthy. They owned the homestead, but their income was small, and the added mouth to fill—and that a hungry one—counted. As the years passed, Huldy came less and less frequently to help in the kitchen, and the sisters' gowns grew more and more rusty and darned.

Ralph, boylike, noticed nothing—indeed, half the year he was away at school; but as the time drew near for the college course and its attendant expenses, the sisters were sadly troubled.

"We might sell," suggested Tabitha, a little choke in her voice.

Rachel started.

"Why, sister!—sell? Oh, no, we couldn't do that!" she shuddered.

"But what can we do?"

"Do?—why lots of things!" Rachel's lips came together with a snap. "It's coming berry time, and there's our chickens, and the garden did beautifully last year. Then there's your lace work and my knitting— they bring something. Sell? Oh—we couldn't do that!" And she abruptly left the room and went out into the yard. There she lovingly trained a wayward vine with new shoots going wrong, and gloated over the rosebushes heavy with crimson buds.

But as the days and weeks flew by and September drew the nearer, Rachel's courage failed her. Berries had been scarce, the chickens had died, the garden had suffered from drought, and but for their lace and knitting work, their income would have dwindled to a pitiful sum indeed. Ralph had been gone all summer; he had asked to go camping and fishing with some of his school friends. He was expected home a week before the college opened, however.

Tabitha grew more and more restless every day. Finally she spoke.

"Rachel, we'll have to sell—there isn't any other way. It would bring a lot," she continued hurriedly, before her sister could speak, "and we could find some pretty rooms somewhere. It wouldn't be so very dreadful!"

"Don't, Tabitha! Seems as though I couldn't bear even to speak of it. Sell?—oh, Tabitha!" Then her voice changed from a piteous appeal to one of forced conviction.

"We couldn't get anywhere near what it's worth, Tabitha, anyway. No one here wants it or can afford to buy it for what it ought to bring. It is really absurd to think of it. Of course, if I had an offer—a good big one—that would be quite another thing; but there's no hope of that."

Rachel's lips said "hope," but her heart said "danger," and the latter was what she really meant. She did not know that but two hours before, a stranger had said to a Fairtown lawyer:

"I want a summer home in this locality. You don't happen to know of a good old treasure of a homestead for sale, do you?"

"I do not," replied the lawyer. "There's a place on the edge of the village that would be just the ticket, but I don't suppose it could be bought for love nor money."

"Where is it?" asked the man eagerly. "You never know what money can do— to say nothing of love—till you try."

The lawyer chuckled softly.

"It's the Hapgood place. I'll drive you over to-morrow. It's owned by two old maids, and they worship every stick and stone and blade of grass that belongs to it. However, I happen to know that cash is rather scarce with them—and there's ample chance for love, if the money fails," he added, with a twitching of his lips.

When the two men drove into the yard that August morning, the Hapgood twins were picking nasturtiums, and the flaming yellows and scarlets lighted up their somber gowns, and made patches of brilliant color against the gray of the house.

"By Jove, it's a picture!" exclaimed the would-be purchaser.

The lawyer smiled and sprang to the ground. Introductions swiftly followed, then he cleared his throat in some embarrassment.

"Ahem! I've brought Mr. Hazelton up here, ladies, because he was interested in your beautiful place."

Miss Rachel smiled—the smile of proud possession; then something within her seemed to tighten, and she caught her breath sharply.

"It is fine!" murmured Hazelton; "and the view is grand!" he continued, his eyes on the distant hills. Then he turned abruptly. "Ladies, I believe in coming straight to the point. I want a summer home, and—I want this one. Can I tempt you to part with it?"

"Indeed, no!" began Rachel almost fiercely. Then her voice sank to a whisper; "I—I don't think you could."

"But, sister," interposed Tabitha, her face alight, "you know you said— that is, there are circumstances—perhaps he would—p-pay enough—" Her voice stumbled over the hated word, then stopped, while her face burned scarlet.

"Pay!—no human mortal could pay for this house!" flashed Rachel indignantly. Then she turned to Hazelton, her slight form drawn to its greatest height, and her hands crushing the flowers, she held till the brittle stems snapped, releasing a fluttering shower of scarlet and gold. "Mr. Hazelton, to carry out certain wishes very near to our hearts, we need money. We will show you the place, and—and we will consider your offer," she finished faintly. It was a dreary journey the sisters took that morning, though the garden never had seemed lovelier, nor the rooms more sacredly beautiful. In the end, Hazelton's offer was so fabulously enormous to their unwilling ears that their conscience forbade them to refuse it.

"I'll have the necessary papers ready to sign in a few days," said the lawyer as the two gentlemen turned to go. And Hazelton added: "If at any time before that you change your minds and find you cannot give it up— just let me know and it will be all right. Just think it over till then," he said kindly, the dumb woe in their eyes appealing to him as the loudest lamentations could not have done. "But if you don't mind, I'd like to have an architect, who is in town just now, come up and look it over with me," he finished.

"Certainly, sir, certainly," said Rachel, longing for the man to go. But when he was gone, she wished him back—anything would be better than this aimless wandering from room to room, and from yard to garden and back again.

"I suppose he will sit here," murmured Tabitha, dropping wearily on to the settee under the apple-trees.

"I suppose so," her sister assented. "I wonder if she knows how to grow roses; they'll certainly die if she doesn't!" And Rachel crushed a worm under her foot with unnecessary vigor.

"Oh, I hope they'll tend to the vines on the summerhouse, Rachel, and the pansies—you don't think they'll let them run to seed, do you? Oh, dear!" And Tabitha sprang nervously to her feet and started backyto the house.

Mr. Hazelton appeared the next morning with two men—an architect and a landscape gardener. Rachel was in the summerhouse, and the first she knew of their presence was the sound of talking outside.

"You'll want to grade it down there," she heard a strange voice say, "and fill in that little hollow; clear away all those rubbishy posies, and mass your flowering shrubs in the background. Those roses are no particular good, I fancy; we'll move such as are worth anything, and make a rose-bed on the south side—we'll talk over the varieties you want, later. Of course these apple-trees and those lilacs will be cut down, and this summerhouse will be out of the way. You'll be surprised— a few changes will do wonders, and—"

He stopped abruptly. A woman, tall, flushed, and angry-eyed, stood before him in the path. She opened her lips, but no sound came—Mr. Hazelton was lifting his hat. The flush faded, and her eyes closed as though to shut out some painful sight; then she bowed her head with a proud gesture, and sped along the way to the house.

Once inside, she threw herself, sobbing, upon the bed. Tabitha found her there an hour later.

"You poor dear—they've gone now," she comforted.

Rachel raised her head.

"They're going to cut down everything—every single thing!" she gasped.

"I know it," choked Tabitha, "and they're going to tear out lots of doors inside, and build in windows and things. Oh, Rachel,—what shall we do?"

"I don't know, oh, I don't know!" moaned the woman on the bed, diving into the pillows and hugging them close to her head.

"We—we might give up selling—he said we could if we wanted to."

"But there's Ralph!"

"I know it. Oh, dear—what can we do?"

Rachel suddenly sat upright.

"Do? Why, we'll stand it, of course. We just mustn't mind if he turns the house into a hotel and the yard into a—a pasture!" she said hysterically. "We must just think of Ralph and of his being a doctor. Come, let's go to the village and see if we can rent that tenement of old Mrs. Goddard's."

With a long sigh and a smothered sob, Tabitha went to get her hat.

Mrs. Goddard greeted the sisters effusively, and displayed her bits of rooms and the tiny square of yard with the plainly expressed wish that the place might be their home.

The twins said little, but their eyes were troubled. They left with the promise to think it over and let Mrs. Goddard know.

"I didn't suppose rooms could be so little," whispered Tabitha, as they closed the gate behind them.

"We couldn't grow as much as a sunflower in that yard," faltered Rachel.

"Well, anyhow, we could have some houseplants!"—Tabitha tried to speak cheerfully.

"Indeed we could!" agreed Rachel, rising promptly to her sister's height; "and, after all, little rooms are lots cheaper to heat than big ones." And there the matter ended for the time being.

Mr. Hazelton and the lawyer with the necessary papers appeared a few days later. As the lawyer took off his hat he handed a letter to Miss Rachel.

"I stepped into the office and got your mail," he said genially.

"Thank you," replied the lady, trying to smile. "It's from Ralph,"— handing it over for her sister to read.

Both the ladies were in somber black; a ribbon or a brooch seemed out of place to them that day. Tabitha broke the seal of the letter, and retired to the light of the window to read it.

The papers were spread on the table, and the pen was in Rachel's hand when a scream from Tabitha shattered the oppressive silence of the room.

"Stop—stop—oh, stop!" she cried, rushing to her sister and snatching the pen from her fingers. "We don't have to—see—read!"—pointing to the postscript written in a round, boyish hand.

Oh, I say, I've got a surprise for you. You think I've been fishing and loafing all summer, but I've been working for the hotels here the whole time. I've got a fine start on my money for college, and I've got a chance to work for my board all this year by helping Professor Heaton. I met him here this summer, and he's the right sort—every time. I've intended all along to help myself a bit when it came to the college racket, but I didn't mean to tell you until I knew I could do it. But it's a sure thing now.

Bye-bye; I'll be home next Saturday.

Your aff. nephew,

Ralph.

Rachel had read this aloud, but her voice ended in a sob instead of in the boy's name. Hazelton brushed the back of his hand across his eyes, and the lawyer looked intently out the window. For a moment there was a silence that could be felt, then Hazelton stepped to the table and fumbled noisily with the papers.

"Ladies, I withdraw my offer," he announced. "I can't afford to buy this house—I can't possibly afford it—it's too expensive." And without another word he left the room, motioning the lawyer to follow.

The sisters looked into each other's eyes and drew a long, sobbing breath.

"Rachel, is it true?"

"Oh, Tabitha! Let's—let's go out under the apple-trees and—just know that they are there!"

And hand in hand they went.

The End