In some little trepidation Mark paced up and down the parlor waiting for his mother, who came ere long, expressing her surprise to find him there, and asking if anything had happened that he seemed so agitated.

"Yes, I'm in a deuced scrape," he answered, coming up to her with the saucy, winning smile she could never resist, and continuing, "To be in at the foundation, you know how much I am in love with Helen Lennox?"

"No, I don't," was the reply, as Mrs. Banker removed her fur with the most provoking coolness. "How should I know when you have never told me?"

"Haven't you eyes? Can't you see? Don't you like her yourself?"

"Yes, very much."

"And are you willing she should be your daughter?"

Mark had his arm around his mother's neck, and bending his face to hers, kissed her playfully as he asked her the last question.

"Say, mother, are you willing I should marry Helen Lennox?"

There was a struggle in Mrs. Banker's heart, and for a moment she felt jealous of the girl whom she had guessed was dearer to her son than ever his mother could be again, but she was a sensible woman. She knew that it was natural for another and a stronger love to come between her and her boy. She liked Helen Lennox. She was willing to take her as a daughter, and she said so at last, and listened half amazed and half amused to the story which had in it so much of Aunt Betsy Barlow, who had cleared away his doubts, and who at that very moment was an occupant of their best guest chamber, sitting with her bonnet on, and waiting for her cap from the Bowery.

"Perhaps it was wrong to bring her home," he added, "but I did it to spare Helen. I knew just what a savage Wilford would be if he found her there, where she would be in the way. Say, mother, was I wrong?"

He was not often wrong in his mother's estimation, and certainly he was not now, when he kissed her so often, begging her to say he had done right.

Certainly he had. Mrs. Banker was very glad to find him so thoughtful; few young men would do as much, she said, and from feeling a little doubtful, Mark came to look upon himself as a very nice young man, who had done a most unselfish act, for of course he had not been influenced by any desire to keep Aunt Betsy from the people who would be present at the dinner, neither had Helen been at all mixed up in the affair.

It was all himself, and he began to whistle "Annie Laurie" very complacently, thinking the while what a clever fellow he was, and meditating other dangerous acts toward the old lady overhead, standing by the window, and wondering what the huge building could be gleaming so white in the fading light.

"Looks as if it was made of stone cheena," she thought, just as Mrs. Banker appeared, her kind, friendly manner making Aunt Betsy feel wholly at ease, as she answered the lady's questions or volunteered remarks of her own.

Mrs. Banker had lived in the country, and had seen just such women as Aunt Betsy Barlow, understanding her intrinsic worth, and knowing how Helen Lennox, though her niece, could still be refined and cultivated. She could also understand how one educated as Wilford Cameron had been would shrink from coming in contact with her, and possibly be rude if she thrust herself upon him. Mark did well to bring her here, she thought, as she left the room to order the tea which the tired woman so much needed. The satchel, umbrella and capbox, with a note from Mattie, had by this time arrived, and in her Sunday cap, with the purple bows, Aunt Betsy felt much better, and enjoyed the tempting little supper, served on silver and Sevres china, the attendant waiting in the hall instead of in her room, where her presence might embarrass one unaccustomed to such usages. They were thoughtful, very kind, and had Mark been her own son she could not have been more deferential than he appeared when just before starting for the dinner he went up to see her, asking what message he should take to Helen. Mrs. Banker, too, came in, her dress eliciting many compliments from her guest, who ventured to ask the price of the diamond pin which fastened the point lace collar. Five hundred dollars seemed an enormous sum, but Aunt Betsy was learning fast not to say all she thought, and merely remarked that Katy had some diamonds, too, which she presumed cost full as much as that.

"She should do very well alone," she said, "she could read her Bible, and if she got too tired, go to bed, though she guessed she should stay up till they came home, so as to hear about the doin's," and with a good-by she sent them away, after saying to Mrs. Banker, "Maybe you ain't the kissin' kind, but if you be, I wish you would kiss Katy once for me."

There was a merry twinkle in Mark's eyes as he asked:

"And Helen, too?"

"I meant your marm, not you," Aunt Betsy answered; while Mrs. Banker raised her hand to her mischievous son, who ran lightly down the stairs, carrying a happier heart than he had known since Helen Lennox had first come to New York, and he had met her at the depot.



CHAPTER XXIX.

THE DINNER PARTY.

It was a very select party which Wilford Cameron entertained that evening; and as the carriages rolled to his door and deposited the guests, the cloud which had been lifting ever since he came home and found "no Barlow woman" there, disappeared entirely, leaving him the blandest, most urbane of hosts, pleased with everybody—himself, his guests, his sister-in-law, and his wife, who had never looked better than she did to-night, in pearls and light blue silk, which harmonized so perfectly with her waxlike complexion. Like some little fairy she flitted through the rooms, receiving, with a sweet childlike grace the kiss which Mrs. Banker gave her, but never dreaming from whom it came. Aunt Betsy's proximity was wholly unsuspected, both by her and Helen, who was very handsome to-night, in crimson and black, with lilies in her hair. Nothing could please Mark better than his seat at table, where he could look into her eyes, which dropped so shyly whenever they met his ardent gaze. Helen was beginning to doubt the story of his engagement with Juno, or at least to think that it might possibly have been broken off. Certainly she could not mistake the nature of the attentions he paid to her, especially to-night, when he hovered continually near her, totally ignoring Juno's presence, and conscious apparently of only one form, one face, and that the face and form of Helen Lennox.

There was another, too, who felt the influence of Helen's beauty, and that was Lieutenant Bob, who, after dinner, attached himself to her side, while around them gathered quite a group, all listening with peals of laughter as Bob, who was something of a mimic, related his adventure of two days before, with "the most rustic and charming old lady it was ever his fortune to meet." Told by Bob the story lost nothing of its freshness; for every particular, except indeed the kindness he had shown her, was related, even to the sheep pasture, about which she was going to New York to consult a lawyer.

"I thought once of referring her to you, Mr. Cameron," Bob said; "but couldn't find it in my heart to quiz her, she was so wholly unsuspicious. You have not seen her, have you?"

"No," came faintly from the lips which tried to smile; for Wilford knew who was the heroine of that story; wondering more and more where she was, and feeling a sensation of uneasiness as he thought, "Can any accident have befallen her?"

It was hardly probable; but Wilford felt very uncomfortable after hearing the story, which had brought a pang of doubt and fear to another mind than his. From the very first Helen feared that Aunt Betsy was the "odd woman" who had gotten upon the train at some station which Bob could not remember; while, as the story progressed, she was sure of it, for she had heard of the sheep-pasture trouble, and of Aunt Betsy's projected visit to New York, privately writing to her mother not to suffer it, as Wilford would be so greatly vexed. "Yes, it must be Aunt Betsy," she thought, and she turned so white that Mark, who was watching both her and Wilford, came as soon as possible to her side, and adroitly separating from the group around, said softly: "You look tired, Miss Lennox. Come with me a moment. I have something to tell you."

Alone with her in the hall, he continued, "I have the sequel of Bob Reynolds' story. That woman—"

"Was Aunt Betsy," Helen gasped. "But where is she now? That was two days ago. Tell me if you know. Mr. Ray, you do know," and in her agony of fear lest something dreadful had happened, she laid her hand on Mark's, beseeching him to tell her if he knew where Aunt Betsy was.

It was worth torturing her for a moment to see the pleading look in her eyes, and feel the soft touch of the hand which he took between both his own, holding it there while he answered her: "Aunt Betsy is at my house; kidnapped by me for safe keeping, until I could consult with you. Was that right?" he asked as a flush came to Helen's cheek, and an expression to her eye which told that his meaning was understood.

"Is she there willingly? How did it happen?" was Helen's reply, her hand still in those of Mark, who thus circumstanced grew very warm and eloquent with the sequel to Bob's story, making it as long as possible, telling what he knew, and also what he had done.

He had not implicated Wilford in any way; but Helen read it all, saying more to herself than him: "And she was at the opera. Wilford must have seen her, and that is why he left so suddenly, and why he has appeared so absent and nervous to-day, as if expecting something. Excuse me," she suddenly added, drawing her hand away and stepping back a little, "I forgot that I was talking as if you knew."

"I do know more than you suppose—that is, I know human nature—and I know Will better than I did that morning when I first met you," Mark said, glancing at the freed hand he wished so much to take again.

But Helen kept her hands to herself, and answered him.

"You did right under the circumstances. It would have been unpleasant for us all had she happened here to-night. I thank you, Mr. Ray—you and your mother, too—more than I can express. I will see her early to-morrow morning. Tell her so, please, and again I thank you."

There were tears in Helen's soft brown eyes, and they glittered like diamonds as she looked even more than spoke her thanks to the young man, who, for another look like that, would have driven Aunt Betsy amid the gayest crowd that ever frequented the Park, and sworn she was his blood relation! A few words from Mrs. Banker confirmed what Mark had said, and it was not strange if that night Miss Lennox, usually so entertaining, was a little absent, for her thoughts were up in that chamber on Twenty-third Street, where Aunt Betsy sat alone, but not lonely, for her mind was very busy with all she had been through since leaving Silverton, while something kept suggesting to her that it would have been wiser and better to have stayed at home than to have ventured where she was so sadly out of place. This last came gradually to Aunt Betsy as she thought the matter over, and remembered Wilford as he had appeared each time he came to Silverton.

"I ain't like him; I ain't like this Miss Banker; I ain't like anybody," she whispered. "I'm nothin' but a homely, old-fashioned woman, without larnin', without nothin'. I might know I wasn't wanted," and a rain of tears fell over the wrinkled face as she uttered this tirade against herself, standing before the long mirror and inspecting the image it gave back of a plain, unpolished countrywoman, not much resembling Mrs. Banker, it must be confessed, nor much resembling the gay young ladies she had seen at the opera the previous night. "I won't go near Katy," she continued; "it will only mortify her, and I don't want to make her trouble. The poor thing's face looked as if she had it now, and I won't add to it. I'll start for home to-morrow. There's Miss Smith, in Springfield, will keep me overnight, and Katy shan't be bothered."

When this decision was reached Aunt Betsy felt a great deal better, and taking the Bible from the table, she sat down again before the fire, opening, as by a special Providence, to the chapter where hewers of wood and drawers of water are mentioned as being necessary to mankind, each filling his appointed place.

"That's me—that's Betsy Barlow," she whispered, taking off her glasses to wipe away the moisture gathering so fast upon them. Then resuming them, she continued: "I'm a hewer of wood—a drawer of water. God made me so, and shall the clay find fault with the potter for making it into a homely jug? No, indeed; and I was a very foolish old jug to think of sticking myself in with the chinaware. But I've larnt a lesson," and the philosophic woman read on, feeling comforted to know that though a vessel of the rudest make, a paltry jug, as she called herself, the promises were still for her as much as for the finer wares—ay, that there was more hope of her entering at last where "the walls are all of precious stones and the streets are paved with gold," than of those whose good things are given so abundantly during their lifetime.

Assured, comforted, and encouraged, she fell asleep at last, and when Mrs. Banker returned she found her slumbering quietly in her chair, the Bible open on her lap, and her finger upon the passage referring to the hewers of wood and drawers of water, as if that was the last thing read.

Next morning, at a comparatively early hour, Helen stood ringing the bell of Mrs. Banker's house. She had passed a restless, but not altogether wretched night, for the remembrance of Mark's kindness in keeping Aunt Betsy away, and his manner while telling her of it would not permit of her being more than anxious as she lay awake, wondering why Mark was so kind, and if it could be possible that he was free from Juno and cared for her. It made her happy to think so, and her face, as she stood upon the steps, looked bright and fresh, instead of pale and tired, as it usually did after a night of wakefulness. She had said to Katy that she was going out and could not tell just when she might return, and as Katy never questioned her acts, while Wilford was too intent upon his own miserable thoughts as to "where Aunt Betsy could be or what had befallen her," to heed any one else, no inquiries were made and no obstacles put in the way of her going to Mrs. Banker's, where Mark met her himself, holding her cold hand until he led her to the fire and placed her in a chair. He knew she would rather meet her aunt alone, and so when he heard her step in the hall he left the room, holding the door for Aunt Betsy, who wept like a little child at the sight of Helen, accusing herself of being a fool, an old fool, who ought to be shut up in the insane asylum, but persisting in saying she was going home that very day without seeing Katy at all. "If she was here I'd like it, but I shan't go there, for I know Wilford don't want me. Say, Helen, don't you think he'll be ashamed of me and wish I was in Guinea?" she asked as her desire to see Katy grew stronger, but was met and combated with her dread of Wilford!

Helen could not tell her he would be ashamed, but Aunt Betsy knew she meant it, and with a fresh gush of tears she gave the project up entirely, telling Helen all she did not already know of her trip to New York, her visit to the opera, her staying with the Tubbses and her meeting with Mark, the best young chap she ever saw, not even excepting Morris. "If he was my own son, he couldn't be kinder," she added, "and I mistrust he hopes to be my nephew. You can't do better, and if he offers, take him."

Helen's cheeks were crimson as she waived this part of the conversation and wished aloud that she had come around in the carriage, as she could thus have taken Aunt Betsy over the city before the train would leave.

"Mark spoke of that when he heard I was going to-day," Aunt Betsy said; "I'll warrant you he'll tend to it."

Aunt Betsy was right, for when Mark and his mother joined their guests and learned that Aunt Betsy's intention was unchanged, he suggested the ride and offered the use of their carriage. Helen did not decline the offer, and ere half an hour had passed, Aunt Betsy, with her satchel, umbrella and capbox, was comfortably adjusted in Mrs. Banker's carriage with Helen beside her, while Mark bade his coachman drive wherever Miss Lennox wished to go, taking care to reach the train in time.

They were tearful thanks which Aunt Betsy gave to her kind friends as she was driven away, going first to the Bowery to say good-by and leave the packages of fruits and herbs, lest the Tubbses should "think her suddenly stuck up."

"Would you mind taking 'Tilda in? It would please her mightily," Aunt Betsy whispered, as they were alighting in front of Mr. Peter Tubbs'; and as the result of this suggestion the carriage, when again it emerged into Broadway, held Mattie Tubbs, happier, prouder than she had been in all her life before, while the gratified mother at home felt amply repaid for all the trouble her visitor had made her.

And Helen enjoyed it, too, finding Mattie a little insipid and tiresome, it is true, but feeling happy in the consciousness that she was making others happy. It was a long drive they took, and Aunt Betsy saw so much that her brain grew giddy and she was glad when they started for the depot, taking Madison Square on the way and passing Katy's house.

"I dare say it is all grand and smart," Aunt Betsy said, leaning out to look at it, "but I feel best at hum where they are used to me."

And her face did bear a brighter look, when finally seated in the cars, than it had before since she left Silverton.

"You'll be home in April, and maybe Katy'll come, too," she whispered as she kissed Helen good-by and shook hands with Mattie Tubbs, thanking her for her kindness in seein' to an old woman, and charging her again never to let the folks in Silverton know that "Betsy Barlow had once been seen at a playhouse."

Slowly the cars moved away and Helen was driven home, leaving Mattie alone in her glory as she rolled down the Bowery, enjoying greatly the eclat of her position, but feeling a little chagrined at not meeting a single acquaintance by whom to be envied and admired. Only Tom saw her alight, giving vent to a whistle, and asking if she didn't feel big, as he tried to hold out his pantaloons in imitation of her dress and walk as she disappeared through the door where the dry goods were swinging.

Katy did not ask where Helen had been, for she was wholly absorbed in Marian Hazelton's letter, telling how fast the baby improved, how pretty it was growing, and how fond both she and Mrs. Hubbell were of it, loving it almost as well as if it were their own.

"I know now it was best for it to go, but it was hard at first," Katy said, putting the letter away, and sighing wearily as she missed the clasp of the little arms and touch of the baby lips.

Several times Helen was tempted to tell her of Aunt Betsy's visit, but decided finally not to do so as it might distress her to know that strangers rendered the hospitalities it was her duty to give, and so Katy never guessed the truth, nor knew what it was which for many days made Wilford so nervous and uneasy, starting quickly at every sudden ring, going often to the window, and looking out into the street as if expecting some one who never came, while he grew strangely anxious for news from Silverton, asking when Katy had heard from home, and why she did not write. One there was, however, who knew and who enjoyed it vastly, watching Wilford closely, and guessing just how his anxiety grew as day after day went by; and she neither came nor was heard from in any way, for Helen did not show the letter apprising her of Aunt Betsy's safe arrival home, and so all in Wilford's mind was left a vague conjecture.

He had seen her, she had been in New York, as was proven by Bob Reynolds, but where was she now, and who were those people with her? Had they entrapped her into some snare, and possibly murdered her? It might be. Such things were not of rare occurrence, and Wilford actually grew poor with the uncertainty which hung over the fate of one whom in his present state of mind he would have warmly welcomed to his fireside, had there been a dozen dinner parties in progress. At last, as he sat one day in his office, with the same worried look on his face, Mark, who had also been watching him, said:

"By the way, Will, how did that sheep pasture come out, or didn't the client appear?"

"Mark," and Wilford's voice was husky with emotion; "you've stumbled upon the very thing which is tormenting my life out of me. Aunt Betsy has never turned up or been heard from since that night. For aught I know she was murdered, or spirited away, and I am half distracted. I'd give a thousand dollars to know what has become of her."

"Put down half that pile and I'll tell you," was Mark's nonchalant reply, while Wilford, seizing his shoulder and compelling him to look up, exclaimed:

"You know, then? Tell me—you do know? Where is she?"

"Safe in Silverton, I presume," was the reply, and then Mark told his story, to which Wilford listened, half incredulous, half indignant, and a good deal relieved.

"You are a splendid fellow, Mark, though I must say you meddled, but I know you did not do it unselfishly. Yes, on the whole, I thank you and Helen, too, for saving me that mortification. I feel like a new man, knowing the old lady is safe at home, where I trust she will remain. And that Tom, who called here yesterday, asking to be our clerk, is the youth I saw at the opera. I thought his face was familiar. Let him come of course. In my gratitude I feel like patronizing the entire Tubbs family."

And so it was this flash of gratitude for a peril escaped which procured for young Tom Tubbs the situation of clerk in the office of Cameron and Ray, the application for such situation having been urged by the ambitious Mattie, who felt her dignity considerably increased when she could speak of Brother Tom in company with Messrs. Cameron & Ray. And it was also a part of the same gratitude which suggested the huge package of merino and gingham, calico and linen, together with the handsome silk shawl and black lace veil, which a few days later was left by the express boy at the door of the farmhouse for Miss Betsy Barlow, who in a long letter overwhelmed Katy with her thanks, and nearly let out her visit to New York, as yet a secret to Mrs. Wilford.



CHAPTER XXX.

THE SEVENTH REGIMENT.

Does the reader remember the pleasant spring days of four years ago, when the thunder of Fort Sumter's bombardment came echoing up to the Northern hills and across the Western prairies, stopping for a moment the pulses of the nation, but quickening them again with a mighty power as from Maine to California man after man arose to smite the maddened foe trailing our honored flag in the dust? Nowhere, perhaps, was the excitement so great or the feeling so strong as in New York, when the Seventh Regiment was ordered on to Washington, its members, who so often had trodden the streets with a proud step, never faltering or holding back, but with a nerving of the will and a putting aside of self, prepared to do their duty. Conspicuous among them was Mark Ray, who, laughing at his mother's fears, kissed her livid cheek, and then with a pang remembered Helen—dearer even than his mother—wondering how she would feel, and thinking the path to danger would be so much easier if he knew her love was his, that her prayers, her wishes would go with him, shielding him from harm and bringing him back again to the sunshine of her presence.

And before he went Mark must know this for certain, chiding himself for having put it off so long. True she had been sick and confined to her room for a long while after Aunt Betsy's memorable visit; and when she was able to go out, Lent had put a stop to her mingling in festive scenes, so that he had seen but little of her, and had never met her alone. But he would write that very day. She knew, of course, that he was going, bidding him Godspeed he was sure, for her whole heart was with the gallant men who had stood so nobly against the enemy, surrendering only because they must. She would say that he did well to go; and she would answer "yes" to the question he would ask her. Mark felt sure of that; but still the letter he wrote was eloquent with his pleadings for her love, while he confessed his own, and asked that she would be his wife—would give him the right to carry her in his heart—to think of her as his affianced bride—to know she waited for his return, and would crown it at last with the full fruition of her priceless love.

"I meet a few of my particular friends at Mrs. Grandon's to-night," he added, in conclusion. "Can I hope to see you there, taking your presence as a token that I may speak and tell you in words what I have so poorly written?"

"She surely will be there, as it is the last, perhaps, she'll ever see of some of us poor wretches," Mark said, his hand trembling a little as he sealed the note, which he would not trust to the post.

He would deliver it himself, avoiding the possibility of a mistake, he said, and half an hour later he rang the bell at No. ——, asking "If Miss Lennox was at home."

She was; and handing the girl the note, Mark ran down the steps, while the servant carried the missive to the library, where upon the table lay other letters received that morning by the penny post, and as yet unopened; for Katy was very busy, and Helen was dressing to go out with Juno Cameron, who had graciously asked her to drive with her that morning and look at a picture she had set her heart on having.

Juno had not yet appeared; but Mark was scarcely out of sight when she came in with the familiarity of a sister and entered the library to wait. Carelessly turning over the books upon the table, she stumbled over Mark's letter, which, through some defect in the envelope, had become unsealed, and lay with its edge lifted so that to peer at its contents was a very easy matter had she been so disposed. But Juno, though indignant and jealous—for she knew the handwriting—could not at first bring herself even to touch what was intended for her rival. But as she gazed the longing grew, until at last she took it in her hand, turning it to the light, and tracing distinctly the words "My dear Helen," while a storm of pain and passion swept over her, mingled with a feeling of shame that she had let herself down so far.

"It does not matter now," the tempter whispered. "You may as well read it and know the worst. Nobody will suspect it," and so, led on step by step, she was about to take the folded letter from the envelope, intending fully to replace it after it was read, when a rapid step warned her some one was coming, and hastily thrusting the letter in her pocket, she dropped her veil to cover her confusion, and then confronted Helen Lennox, ready for the drive, and all unconscious of the wrong which could not then be righted.

Juno was unusually kind and familiar that morning, delicately complimenting Helen's taste with regard to pictures, and trying in various ways to forget the letter which lay upon her conscience like a leaden weight, driving all other thoughts from her mind, and leaving only the torturing one, "How can I return it without detection?" Juno did not mean to keep the letter, and all that morning she was devising measures for making restitution, even thinking once to confess the whole, but shrinking from that as more than she could do. As they were driving home they met Mark Ray; but Helen, who chanced to be looking in an opposite direction, did not see the earnest look of scrutiny he gave her, scarcely heeding Juno, whose face was all ablaze with guilt as she returned his bow, and whose voice trembled as she spoke of him to Helen and his intended departure. Helen observed the tremor in her voice, and pitied the girl whose agitation she fancied arose from the fact that her lover was so soon to go where danger and possibly death were waiting. In Helen's heart, too, there was a cutting pang whenever she remembered Mark, and what had so recently passed between them, raising hopes which now were wholly blasted. For he was Juno's, she believed, and the grief at his projected departure was the cause of that young lady's softened and even humbled demeanor, as she insisted on Helen's stopping at her house for lunch before going home.

To this Helen consented—Juno still revolving in her mind how to return the letter, which grew more and more a horror to her. It was in her pocket yet, she knew, for she had felt it there when, after lunch, she went to her room for a fresh handkerchief. She would accompany Helen home, would manage to slip into the library alone, and put it partly under a book, so that it would appear to be hidden, and thus account for it not having been seen before; or better yet, she would catch it up playfully and banter Helen on her carelessness in leaving her love letters so exposed. This last seemed a very clever plan, and with her spirits quite elated, Juno drove around with Helen, finding no one in the parlor below, and felicitating herself upon the fact that Helen left her alone while she ran up to Katy.

"Now is my time," she thought, stealing noiselessly into the library and feeling for the letter.

But it was not there. It was missing, gone, and no amount of search, no shaking of handkerchief, or turning of pocket inside out could avail to find it. The letter was lost, and in the utmost consternation Juno returned to the parlor, still hunting for the letter, and appearing so abstracted as scarcely to be civil when Katy came down to see her; asking if she was going that night to Sybil Grandon's, and talking of the dreadful war, which she hoped would not be a war after all. Juno was too wretched to talk, and after a few moments she started for home, hunting in her own room and through the halls, but failing in her search, and finally giving it up, with the consoling reflection that were it found in the street, as seemed quite probable, no suspicion could fasten on her; and as fear of detection, rather than contrition for the sin, had been the cause of her distress, she grew comparatively calm, save when her conscience made itself heard and admonished confession as the only reparation which was now in her power. But Juno could not confess, and all that day she was absent-minded and silent, while her mother watched her closely, wondering what connection, if any, there was between her burning cheeks and the letter she had found upon the floor in her daughter's room just after she had left it; the letter, at whose contents she had glanced, shutting her lips firmly together as she saw that her plans had failed, and finally putting the document away where there was less hope of its ever finding its rightful owner than if it had remained with Juno. Had Mrs. Cameron supposed that Helen had already seen it, she would have returned it at once; but of this she had her doubts, after learning that "Miss Lennox did not go upstairs at all." Juno, then, must have been the delinquent; and though the mother shrank from the act as unladylike, if nothing more, she resolved to keep the letter till some inquiry was made for it at least. And so Helen, sitting by her window, and looking dreamily out into the street, with a feeling of sad foreboding as she thought of the dark cloud which had burst so suddenly upon the nation's horizon, enveloping Mark Ray in its dark fold, and bearing him away, possibly never to return again, had no suspicion of the truth, and did not guess how anxiously the young man was anticipating the interview at Sybil Grandon's, scarcely doubting that she would be there, and fancying just the expression of her eyes when they first met his. Alas for Mark, also for Helen, that both should be so cruelly deceived. Had the latter known of the loving words sent from the true heart which longed for some word of hers to lighten the long march and beguile the tedious days of absence, she would not have said to Katy, when asked if going to Mrs. Grandon's, "Oh, no; please don't urge me. I would so much rather stay at home."

Katy would not insist and so went alone with Wilford to the entertainment given to a few young men who seemed as heroes then, when the full meaning of that word had not been exemplified, as it has been since in the life so cheerfully laid down and the heart's blood poured so freely, by the tens of thousands who have won a martyr's and a hero's name. Curiously, eagerly Mark Ray scanned each new arrival, feeling his lips grow white and his pulses faint when he at last caught sight of Wilford's tall figure, and looked for what might be beside it. But only Katy was there. Helen had not come, and with a feeling of chill despair Mark listened while Katy explained to Mrs. Grandon that her sister had fully intended coming in the morning, but had suddenly changed her mind and begged to be excused.

"I am sorry," Sybil said, "and so I am sure is Mr. Ray," turning lightly to Mark, whose white face froze the gay laugh on her lips and made her try to shield him from observation until he had time to recover himself and appear as usual.

How Mark blessed Sybil Grandon for that kindness, and how wildly the blood throbbed through his veins as he thought "She would not come. She does not care. I have deceived myself in hoping that she did, and now welcome war, welcome anything which shall help me to forget."

Mark was very wretched, and his wretchedness showed itself upon his face, making more than one rally him for what they termed fear, while they tried to reassure him that to the Seventh there could be no danger after Baltimore was safely passed. This was more than Mark could bear, and at an early hour he left the house, bidding Katy good-by in the hall, and telling her he probably should not see her again, as he would not have time to call.

"Not call to say good-by to Helen," Katy exclaimed.

"Helen will not care," was Mark's reply as he hurried away into the darkness of the night, more welcome in his present state of mind than the gay scene he had left.

And this was all Katy had to carry to Helen, who beat the window pane nervously, fighting back the tears wrung out by her disappointment, for she had expected to see Mark once more, to bless him as a sister might bless a brother, speaking to him words of cheer and bidding him go on to where duty led. But he was not coming and she only saw him from the carriage window, as with proud step and head erect he passed with his regiment through the densely crowded streets, where the wailing cries and the loud hurrahs of the multitude, which no man could number, rent the air and told how terribly in earnest the great city was, and how its heart was with that gallant band, their pet, their pride, sent forth on a mission such as it had never had before. But Mark did not see Helen, and only his mother's white face as it looked when it said "God bless my boy" was clear before his eyes as he moved on through Broadway and down Cortlandt Street, until the ferryboat received him, and the crowd began to disperse.

There was more than one pillow wet with tears that night as mothers, wives and sisters wept for the loved ones gone, but nowhere were sadder, bitterer tears shed than in the silent chamber where Helen Lennox prayed that God would guard that regiment and bring it back again as full of life and vigor as it had gone away. For them all she prayed, in a general kind of way, but there was one whose image was in her heart, whose name was ever on her lip, breaking the silence of the room, which echoed the name of Mark, who, could he have heard that prayer, would have cast aside the heavy pain, so hard to bear during those first days when his cruel disappointment was fresh and the soldier duty new.

Now that Mark was gone, Mrs. Banker turned intuitively to Helen, finding greater comfort in her quiet sympathy than in the more wordy condolence offered by Juno, who as she heard nothing from the letter, began to lose her fears of detection and even suffer her friends to rally her upon the absence of Mark Ray and the anxiety she must feel on his account. Moments there were, however, when thoughts of the stolen letter brought a pang, while Helen's face was a continual reproach, and she was glad when toward the first of May her rival left New York for Silverton, where, as the spring and summer work came on, her services were needed.



CHAPTER XXXI.

KATY GOES TO SILVERTON.

A summer day in Silverton—a soft, bright August day, when the early rareripes by the well were turning their red cheeks to the sun, and the flowers in the garden were lifting their heads proudly and nodding to each other as if they knew the secret which made that day so bright above all others. Old Whitey, by the hitching post, was munching at his oats and glancing occasionally at the covered buggy standing on the greensward, fresh and clean as water from the pond could make it; the harness, new, not mended, lying upon a rock, where Katy used to feed the sheep with salt, and the whip standing upright in its socket, all waiting for the deacon, donning his best suit of clothes, even to a stiff shirt collar which almost cut his ears, his face shining with anticipations which he knew would be realized. Katy was really coming home, and in proof thereof there were behind the house and barn piles of rubbish, lath and plaster, moldy paper and broken bricks, the tokens and remains of the repairing process, which for so long a time had made the farmhouse a scene of dire confusion, driving its inmates nearly distracted, except when they remembered for whose sake they endured so much, inhaling clouds of lime, stepping over heaps of mortar, tearing their dress skirts on sundry nails projecting from every conceivable quarter, and wondering the while if the masons ever would finish or the carpenters be gone.

As a condition on which Katy might be permitted to come home, Wilford had stipulated an improvement in the interior arrangement of the house, offering to bear the expense even to the furnishing of the rooms. To this the family demurred at first, not liking Wilford's dictatorial manner, nor his insinuation that their home was not good enough for his wife, Mrs. Katy Cameron. But Helen turned the tide, appreciating Wilford's feelings better than the others could do, and urging a compliance with his request.

"Anything to get Katy home," she said, and so the chimney was torn away, a window was put here and an addition made there, until the house was really improved with its pleasant, modern parlor and the large airy bedroom, with bathing-room attached, the whole the idea of Wilford, who graciously deigned to come out once or twice from New London, where he was spending a few weeks, to superintend the work and suggest how it should be done.

The furniture, too, which he sent on from New York, was perfect in its kind, not elegant like Katy's, but well adapted to the rooms it was to adorn, and suitable in every respect. Helen enjoyed the settling very much, and when it was finished it was hard telling which was the more pleased, she or good Aunt Betsy, who, having confessed in a general kind of way at a sewing society that she did go to a playhouse, and was not so very sorry either, except as the example might do harm, had nothing on her conscience now, nothing to fear from New York, and was proportionately happy. At least she would have been if Morris had not seemed so off, as she expressed it, and evincing no pleasure at Katy's expected visit. He had been polite to Wilford, had kept him at Linwood, taking him to and from the depot, but even Wilford had thought him changed, telling Katy how very sober and grave he had become, rarely smiling, and not seeming to care to talk unless it were about his profession or on some religious topic. And Morris was greatly changed. The wound which in most hearts would have healed by this time had grown deeper with each succeeding year, while from all he heard he felt sure that Katy's marriage was a sad mistake, wishing sometimes that he had spoken, and so perhaps have saved her from the life in which she could not be wholly free. "She would be happier with me," he had said, with a sad smile to Helen, when once she told him of some things which she had not mentioned elsewhere, and there were great tears in Morris' eyes, tears of which he was not ashamed when Helen spoke of Katy's distress, and the look which crept into her face when baby was taken away. When Morris first heard of the baby he had hoped he might love Katy less; that she would seem to him as more a wife and less a girl, but she did not, and there were times when the silent doctor, living alone at Linwood, felt that his grief was too great to bear. But the deep, dark waters were always forded safely, and Morris' faith in God prevailed, so that only a dull, heavy pain remained, with the consciousness that it was no sin to remember Katy as she was remembered now. Oh, how he had longed to see her, and yet how he had dreaded it, lest poor weak human flesh should prove inadequate to the sight. But she was coming home; Providence had ordered that and he accepted it, looking eagerly for the time when he should see her again, but repressing his eagerness, so that not even Helen suspected how impatient he was for the day of her return. Four weeks she had been at the Pequot House in New London, occupying a little cottage and luxuriating in the joy of having her child with her almost every day. Country air and country nursing had wrought wonders in the baby, which had grown so beautiful and bright that it was no longer in Wilford's way save as it took too much of Katy's time, and made her careless for the gay crowd at the hotel.

Marian was working at her trade, and never came to the hotel except one day when Wilford was in New York, but that day sufficed for Katy to know that after herself it was Marian whom baby loved the best—Marian, who cared for it even more than Mrs. Hubbell. And Katy was glad to have it so, especially after Wilford and his mother decided that she must leave the child in New London while she made the visit to Silverton.

Wilford did not like her taking so much care of it as she was inclined to do. It had grown too heavy for her to lift; it was better with Mrs. Hubbell, he said, and so to the inmates of the farmhouse Katy wrote that baby was not coming.

They were bitterly disappointed, for Katy's baby had been anticipated quite as much as Katy herself, Aunt Betsy bringing from the woodshed chamber a cradle which nearly forty years before had rocked the deacon's only child, the little boy, who died just as he had learned to lisp his mother's name. As a momento of those days the cradle had been kept, Katy using it sometimes for her kittens and her dolls, until she grew too old for that, when it was put away beneath the eaves whence Aunt Betsy dragged it, scouring it with soap and sand, until it was white as snow. But it would not be needed, and with a sigh the old lady carried it back, thinking "things had come to a pretty pass when a woman who could dance and carouse till twelve o'clock at night was too weakly to take care of her child," and feeling a very little awe of Katy who must have grown so fine a lady.

But all this passed away as the time drew near when Katy was to come, and no one seemed happier than Aunt Betsy on the morning when Whitey was eating his oats, and the carriage stood on the greensward. The sky above and the earth beneath were much as they were that other day when they were expecting Katy, but Helen's face was not as bright, or her steps as buoyant. She could not forget who was there one year ago, and all the morning painful memories had been tugging at her heart as she remembered the past, and wondered at the gloomy silence which Mark Ray had maintained toward her ever since the day when the Seventh Regiment left New York, followed by so many prayers and tears. He had returned, she knew, but neither from his mother nor himself had there ever come a word or message for her, while Bell Cameron, who wrote to her occasionally, had spoken of his attentions to Juno as becoming more pointed than ever.

"I have strong hopes that in time Juno will be quite a woman," Bell added. "She is not so proud and sarcastic as she used to be, and all the while Mark was gone she seemed very much depressed, so that I began to believe she really liked him. You would hardly recognize her in her new phase, she acts so humble like, as if she were constantly asking forgiveness; and this, you know, is something novel for her."

After this letter Helen sat herself resolutely at work to forget all that had ever passed between herself and Mark, succeeding so well that Silverton and its duties ceased to be very irksome, until the anniversary of the morning when he had twined the lily in her hair, and looked such fancies in her heart. It was well for her that too many things were claiming her attention to allow of solitary regrets.

Katy's room was to be arranged, Katy's "box bed," as Aunt Betsy called it, to be fixed, flowers to be gathered for the parlor and vegetables for the dinner, so that her hands were full, up to the moment when Uncle Ephraim drove away from the door, setting old Whitey into a canter, which, by the time the "race" was reached, had become a rapid trot, the old man holding up his reins and looking proudly at the oat-fed animal, speeding along so fast.

He did not have long to wait this time, for the train came rolling across the meadow, and while his head was turned toward the car where he fancied she might be, a pair of arms were thrown impetuously around his neck, and a little figure, standing on tiptoe, almost pulled him down in its attempts to kiss him.

"Uncle Eph! oh, Uncle Eph, I've come! I'm here," a young voice cried; but the words the deacon would have spoken were smothered by the kisses which pressed upon his lips, kisses which only came to an end when a voice said, rather reprovingly: "There, Katy, that will do. You have almost strangled him."

Wilford had not been expected, and the expression of the deacon's face was not a very cordial greeting to the young man who hastened to explain that he should only stop till the next train, and then go on to Boston. In his presence the deacon was not quite natural, but he lifted in his arms his "little Katy-did," looking straight into her face, where there were as yet no real lines of care, only shadows, which told that in some respects she was not the same Katy he had parted with two years before. There was a good deal of the city about her dress and style, and the deacon felt a little overawed at first; but this wore off as on their way to the farmhouse, she, sitting partly in his lap and partly in her husband's, kept one hand upon his neck, her snowy fingers occasionally playing with his silvery hair, while she looked at him with her loving old smile, and asked questions about the people he supposed she had forgotten, nodding to everybody she met, whether she knew them or not, and at last, as the old house came in sight, hiding her face in a gush of happy tears upon his neck, not Wilford's. That gentleman was watching her in silence, wishing she were less impulsive, and wondering at the strong home-love he could not understand. To him there was nothing pleasant in that low, humble farmhouse, or in the rocks and hills which overshadowed it; while, with the exception of Helen, the women gathered at the door as they came up were very distasteful to him. But with Katy it was different. They were her rocks, her hills, her woods, and more than all, they were her folks into whose arms she threw herself with an impetuous rush, scarcely waiting for old Whitey to stop, but with one leap clearing the wheel and springing first to the embrace of her mother. It was a joyful meeting, and when the first excitement was over Katy inspected the improvements, approving all, and thanking Wilford for having done so much for her comfort.

"I shall sleep so nicely here," she said, tossing her hat into Helen's lap, and lying down at once upon the bed it had taken so long to make. "Yes, I shall rest so nicely, knowing I can wear my wrapper all day long. Don't look so horrified, Wilford," she added, as she caught his eye. "I shall dress me sometimes; but you don't know what a luxury it is to feel that I need not unless I like."

"Didn't you rest at New London?" Helen asked, when Wilford had left the room.

"Yes, some," Katy replied; "but there were dances every night, or sails upon the bay, and I had to go, for many of our friends were there, and Wilford was not willing for me to be quiet."

This, then, was the reason why Katy came home so weary and pale, and craving so much the rest she had not had in more than two years. But she would get it now, and before the first dinner was eaten some of her old color came stealing back to her cheeks, and her eyes began to dance just as they used to do, while her merry voice rang out in silvery peals at Aunt Betsy's quaint remarks, which struck her so forcibly from not having heard them for so long a tune. A hit of a lecture Wilford deemed it his duty to give her when after dinner they sat together alone for half an hour. "She must restrain herself. Surely she was old enough to be more womanly, and she would tire herself out with her nervous restlessness, besides giving the people a bad opinion of Mrs. Wilford Cameron."

To this Katy listened quietly, breathing freer when it was over, and breathing freer still when Wilford was gone, even though her tears did fall as she watched him out of sight, and knew it would be at least four weeks before she saw him again. To the entire family his departure brought relief; but they were not prepared for the change it produced in Katy; who, freed from all restraint, came back so soon to what she was when a young, careless girl she sat upon the doorsteps and curled the dandelion stalks. She did not do this now, for there were none to curl; but she strung upon a thread the delicate petals of the phlox growing by the door, and then bound it as a crown about the head of her mother, who could not yet quite recognize her Katy in the elegant Mrs. Wilford Cameron, with rustling silk, and diamonds flashing on her hands every time they moved. But when she saw her racing with the old brown goat and its little kid out in the apple orchard, her head uncovered, and her bright curls blowing about her face, the feeling disappeared, and she felt that Katy had indeed come back again.

And where all the while was Morris? Were his patients so numerous that he could not find time to call upon his cousin? Katy had inquired for him immediately after her arrival, but in her excitement she had forgotten him again, until Wilford was gone and tea was over, when, just as she had done on the day of her return from Canandaigua, she took her hat and started on the well-worn path toward Linwood. She was not going there, she said, she only wanted to try the road and see if it had changed since she used to go that way to gather butternuts in the autumn or berries in the summer. Airily she tripped along, her light plaid silk gleaming through the deep green of the trees and revealing her coming to the tired man sitting upon a little rustic seat, beneath a chestnut tree, where he once had sat with Katy, and extracted a cruel sliver from her hand, kissing the place to make it well as she told him to. She was a child then, a little girl of twelve, and he was twenty, but the sight of her pure face lifted confidingly to his had stirred his heart as no other face had stirred it since, making him look forward to a time when the hand he kissed would be his own, and his the fairy form he watched so carefully as it expanded day by day into the perfect woman. He was thinking of that time now, and how different it had all turned out, when he heard the bounding step and saw her coming toward him, swinging her hat in childish abandon, and warbling a song she had learned from him.

"Morris, oh, Morris!" she cried, as she ran eagerly forward; "I am so glad to see you. It seems so nice to be with you once more here in the dear old woods. Don't get up—please don't get up," she continued, as he started to rise.

She was standing before him, a hand on either side of his face, into which she was looking quite as wistfully as he was regarding her. Something she missed in his manner, something which troubled her; and thinking she knew what it was, she said to him: "Why don't you kiss me, Morris? You used to. Ain't you glad to see me?"

"Yes, very glad," he answered, and drawing her down to the bench beside him, he kissed her twice, but so gravely, so quietly, that Katy was not satisfied at all, and tears gathered in her eyes as she tried to think what it was ailed Morris.

He was very thin, and there were a few white hairs about his temples, so that, though four years younger than her husband, he seemed to her much older, quite grandfatherly in fact, and this accounted for the liberties she took, asking what was the matter, and trying to make him like her again, by assuring him that she was not as vain and foolish as he must suppose from what Helen had probably told him of her life since leaving Silverton.

"I do not like it at all," she said. "I am in it, and must conform; but, oh Morris! you don't know how much happier I should be if Wilford were just like you, and lived at Linwood instead of New York. I should be so happy here with baby all the time."

It was well she spoke that name, for Morris, listening to her as she charged him with indifference, could not have borne much more; but the mention of her child had a strange power over him, of quieting him at once, so that he could calmly tell her that she was the same to him that she had always been, while with his next breath he asked: "Where is your baby, Katy?" adding with a smile: "I can remember when you were a baby, and I held you in my arms."

"Can you really?" Katy said; and as if that remembrance made him older than the hills, she nestled her curly head against his shoulder, while she told him of her bright-eyed darling, and as she talked the mother-love which spread itself over her girlish face made it more beautiful than anything Morris had ever seen.

"Surely an angel's countenance cannot be fairer, purer than hers," he thought, listening while she talked of the only thing which had a power to separate her from him, making her seem as a friend, or at most as a beloved sister.

A long time they talked together, and the sun was setting ere Morris rose, suggesting that she go home, as the night dew would soon be falling.

"And you are not as strong as you once were," he added, pulling her shawl around her shoulders with careful solicitude, and thinking how slender she had become.

From the back parlor Helen saw them coming up the path, detecting the changed expression of Morris' face, and feeling a pang of fear when as he left them after nine o'clock she heard her mother say that he had not appeared so natural since Katy went away as he had done that night. Knowing what she did, Helen trembled for Morris, with this terrible temptation before him, and Morris trembled for himself as he went back the lonely path, and stopped again beneath the chestnut tree where he had so lately sat with Katy. There was a great fear at his heart, and it found utterance in words as kneeling by the rustic bench with only the lonely night around him and the green boughs overhead, he asked that he might be kept from sin, both in thought and deed, and be to Katy Cameron just what she took him for, her friend and elder brother. And God, who knew the sincerity of the heart thus pleading before him, heard and answered the prayer, so that after that first night of trial Morris could look on Katy without a wish that she were otherwise than Wilford Cameron's wife and the mother of his child. He was happier because of her being at the farmhouse, though he did not go there one-half as often as she came to him. She seemed to prefer Linwood to the farmhouse, staying there hours, both when he was at home and when he was away, strolling through his garden, or sitting quietly in the pleasant summer-house which looked out upon the pond.

Those September days were happy ones to Katy, who, freed from all restraint, became a child again—a petted, spoiled child, whom every one caressed and suffered to have her way. To Uncle Ephraim it was as if some bright angel had suddenly dropped into his path, flooding it with sunshine, and making him so glad to have back his "Katy-did," who went with him to the fields, waiting patiently till his work was done, and telling him of all the wondrous things she saw abroad, but speaking little of her city life. That was something she did not care to talk about, and but for Wilford's letters, and the frequent mention of baby, the deacon could easily have imagined that Katy had never left him. But these were barriers between the old life and the present, these were the insignia of Mrs. Wilford Cameron, who was watched and envied by the curious Silvertonians, and pronounced charming by them all. Still there was one drawback to Katy's happiness. She missed her child, mourning for it so much that her family, quite as anxious as herself to see it, suggested her sending for it. It would surely take no harm with them, and Marian would come with it. To this plan Katy listened more willingly from the fact that Wilford had gone West, and the greater the distance between them the more she dared to do. And so Marian Hazelton was one day startled at the sudden appearance at the cottage of Katy, who had come to take her and baby to Silverton.

There was no resisting the vehemence of Katy's arguments, and before the next day's sunsetting, the farmhouse, usually so quiet and orderly, had been turned into one general nursery, where Baby Cameron reigned supreme, screaming with delight at the tinware which Aunt Betsy brought out from the cake cutter to the dipper, the little creature beating a noisy tattoo upon the latter with an iron spoon, and then for diversion burying its fat dimpled hands in Uncle Ephraim's long white hair, for the old man went down upon all fours to do his great-grand niece homage.

That night Morris came up, stopping suddenly as a loud baby laugh reached him, even across the orchard, and leaning for a moment against the wall, while he tried to prepare himself for the shock it would be to see Katy's child, and hold it in his arms, as he knew he must, or the mother be aggrieved.

He had supposed it was pretty, but he was not prepared for the beautiful little cherub which in its short white dress, with its soft curls of golden brown clustering about its head, stood holding to a chair, pushing it occasionally, and venturing now and then to take a step, while its infantile laugh mingled with the screams of its delighted auditors, watching it with so much interest.

There was one great, bitter, burning pang, a blur before his eyes, and then, folding his arms composedly upon the window sill, Dr. Grant stood looking in upon the occupants of the room, whistling at last to baby, as he was accustomed to whistle to the children of his patients.

"Oh, Morris," Katy cried, "baby can almost walk, Marian has taken so much pains, and she can say 'papa.' Isn't she a beauty?"

Baby had turned her head by this time, her ear caught by the whistle and her eye arrested by something in Morris which fascinated her gaze. Perhaps she thought of Wilford, of whom she had been very fond, for she pushed her chair toward him and then held up her fat, creasy arms for him to take her. Morris was fond of children and took the infant at once, strained it to his bosom with a passionate caress, which seemed to have in it something of the love he bore the mother, who went off into ecstasies of joy when baby, attacking Morris' hair and patting softly his cheek, tried to kiss him as it had been taught by Marian. Never was mother prouder, happier than Katy during the first few days succeeding baby's arrival, while the family seemed to tread on air, so swiftly the time went by with that active little life in their midst, stirring them up so constantly, putting to rout all their rules of order and keeping their house in a state of delightful confusion.

It was wonderful how rapidly the child improved with so many teachers, learning to lisp its mother's name and taught by her attempting to say "Doctor." From the very first the child took to Morris, crying after him whenever he went away, and hailing his arrival with a crow of joy and an eager attempt to reach him.

"It was altogether too forward for this world," Aunt Betsy often said, shaking her head ominously, but not really meaning what she predicted, even when for a few days it did not seem as bright as usual, but lay quietly in Katy's lap, a blue look about the mouth and a flush upon its cheeks, which neither Morris nor Marian liked.

More accustomed to children than the other members of the family, they both watched it closely, Morris coming over twice one day, and the last time he came regarding Katy with a look as if he would fain ward off from her some evil-which he feared.

"What is it, Morris?" she asked. "Is baby going to be very sick?" and a great crushing fear came upon her as she waited for his answer.

"I hope not," he said; "I cannot tell as yet; the symptoms are like cholera infantum, of which I have several cases, but if taken in time I apprehend no danger."

There was a low shriek and baby opened its heavy lids and moaned, while Helen came at once to Katy, holding her hand upon her heart as if the pain had entered there. To Marian it was no news, for ever since the early morning she had suspected the nature of the disease stealing over the little child, so suddenly stricken down, and looking by the lamplight so pale and sick. All night the light burned in the farmhouse, where there were anxious, troubled faces, Katy bending constantly over her darling, and even amid her terrible anxiety dreading Wilford's displeasure when he should hear what she had done and its possible result. She did not believe as yet that her child would die; but she suffered acutely, watching for the early dawn when Morris had said he would be there, and when at last he came, begging of him to stay, to leave his other patients and care only for baby.

"Would that be right?" Morris asked, and Katy blushed for her selfishness when she heard how many were sick and dying around them. "I will spend every leisure moment here," he said, leaving his directions with Marian and then hurrying away without a word of hope for the child, growing worse so fast that when the night shut down again it lay upon a pillow, its blue eyes closed and its head thrown back, while its sad moanings could only be hushed by carrying it in one's arms about the room, a task which Katy could not do.

She had tried it once, refusing all their offers with the reply: "Baby is mine and shall I not carry her?"

But the feeble strength gave out, the limbs began to totter, and staggering backward she cried: "Somebody must take her."

It was Marian who went forward, Marian, whose face was a puzzle as she took the infant in her stronger arms, her stony eyes, which had not wept as yet, fastening themselves upon the face of Wilford Cameron's child with a look which seemed to say: "Retribution, retribution."

But only when she remembered the father, now so proud of his daughter, was that word in her heart. She could not harbor it when she glanced at the mother, and her lips moved in earnest prayer that, if possible, God would not leave her so desolate. An hour later and Morris came, relieving Marian of her burden which he carried in his own arms, while he strove to comfort Katy, who, crouching by the empty crib, was sitting motionless in a kind of dumb despair, all hope crushed out by his answer to her entreaties that he would tell her the truth, keeping nothing back.

"I think your baby will die," he had said to her very gently, pausing a moment in awe of the white face, whose expression terrified and shocked him, it was so full of agony.

Bowing her head upon her hands, poor Katy whispered sadly: "God must not take my baby. Oh, Morris, please pray that he will not. He will hear and answer you, while I have been so bad I cannot pray. But I'm not going to be bad again. If he will let me keep my darling I will begin a new life. I will try to serve him. Dear Lord, hear and answer, and not let baby die."

She was praying herself now, and Morris' broad chest heaved as he glanced at her kneeling figure, and then at the death-like face upon the pillow, with the pinched look about the nose and lips, which to his practiced eye was a harbinger of death.

"Its father should be here," he thought, and when Katy lifted up her head again he asked if she was sure her husband had not yet returned from Minnesota.

"Yes, sure—that is, I think he has not," was Katy's answer, a chill creeping over her at the thought of meeting Wilford, and giving him his daughter dead.

"I shall telegraph in the morning at all events," Morris continued, "and if he is not in New York, it will be forwarded."

"Yes, that will be best," was the reply, spoken so mournfully that Morris stopped in front of Katy, trying to reason with her.

But Katy would not listen, only answering to him that he did not know, he could not feel, he never had been tried.

"Perhaps not," Morris said; "but Heaven is my witness, Katy, that if I could save you this pain by giving up my life for baby's, I would do it willingly; but God does not give us our choice. He knoweth what is best, and baby is better with Him than us."

For a moment Katy was silent, then, as a new idea took possession of her mind, she sprang to Morris' side and seizing his arm, demanded: "Can an unbaptized child be saved?"

"We nowhere read that baptism is a saving ordinance," was Morris' answer; while Katy continued: "But do you believe they will be saved?"

"Yes, I do," was the decided response, which, however, did not ease Katy's mind, and she moaned on: "A child of heathen parents may, but I knew better, I knew it was my duty to give the child to God, and for a foolish fancy withheld the gift until it is too late, and God will take it without the mark upon its forehead, the water on its brow. Oh, baby, baby, if she should be lost—no name, no mark, no baptismal sign."

"Not water, but the blood of Jesus cleanseth from all sin," Morris said, "and as sure as he died so sure this little one is safe. Besides that, there may be time for the baptism yet—that is, to-morrow. Baby will not die to-night, and if you like, it still shall have a name."

Eagerly Katy seized upon that idea, thinking more of the sign, the water, than the name, which scarcely occupied her thoughts at all. It did not matter what the child was called, so that it became one of the little ones in glory, and with a calmer, quieter demeanor than she had shown that day she saw Morris depart at a late hour; and then turning to the child which Uncle Ephraim now was holding, kissed it lovingly, whispering as she did so: "Baby shall be baptized—baby shall have the sign."



CHAPTER XXXII.

LITTLE GENEVRA.

Morris had telegraphed to New York, receiving in reply that Wilford was hourly expected home, and would at once hasten on to Silverton. The clergyman, Mr. Kelly, had also been seen, but owing to a funeral which would take him out of town, he could not be at the farmhouse until five in the afternoon, when, if the child still lived, he would be glad to officiate as requested. All this Morris had communicated to Katy, who listened in a kind of stupor, gasping for breath, when she heard that Wilford would so soon be there, and moaning "that will be too late," when told that the baptism could not take place till night. Then, kneeling by the crib where the child was lying, she fastened her great, sad blue eyes upon the pallid face with an earnestness as if thus she would hold till nightfall the life flickering so faintly and seeming so nearly finished. The wailings had ceased, and they no longer carried it within their arms, but had placed it in its crib, where it lay perfectly still, save as its eyes occasionally unclosed and turned wistfully toward the cups, where it knew was something which quenched its raging thirst. Once, indeed, as the hours crept on to noon and Katy bent over it so that her curls swept its face, it seemed to know her, and the little wasted hand was for a moment uplifted and rested on her cheek with the same caressing motion it had been wont to use in health. Then hope whispered that it might live, and with a great cry of joy Katy sobbed: "She knows me, Morris—mother, see; she knows me. Maybe she will live."

But the dull stupor which succeeded to that act swept all hope away, and again Katy resumed her post, watching first her dying child, and then the long hands of the clock which crept on so slowly, pointing to only two when she thought it must be five. Would that hour never come, or coming, would it find baby there? None could answer that last question—they could only wait and pray, and as they waited thus the warm September sun neared the western sky till its yellow beams came stealing through the window and across the floor to where Katy sat watching its onward progress and looking sometimes out upon the hills where the purplish autumnal haze was lying just as she once loved to see it; but she did not heed it now, or care how bright the day with the flitting shadows dancing on the grass, the tall flowers growing by the door and old Whitey standing by the gate, his head stretched toward the house in a kind of dreamy, listening attitude, as if he, too, knew of the great sorrow hastening on so fast. The others saw all this, and it made their hearts ache more as they thought of the beautiful little child, so much fairer than sky or day or flowers could be, going from their midst when they wished so much to keep her. But Katy had only one idea, and that was of the child growing very restless now and throwing up its arms as if in pain. It is striking five, and with each stroke the dying baby moans, while Katy strains her ear to catch another sound, the sound of horses' hoofs hurrying up the road. The clergyman has come and anon the inmates of the house gather around in silence, while he makes ready to receive the child into Christ's flock, where it so soon will really be.

Mrs. Lennox had questioned Helen about the name and Helen had answered: "Katy knows, I presume. It does not matter," but no one had spoken directly to Katy, who had scarcely given it a thought, caring more for the rite she had deferred so long.

"He must hasten," she said to Morris, her eyes fixed upon the panting child she had lifted to her own lap, and thus abjured the clergyman failed to make the usual inquiry concerning the name he was to give.

Calm and white as a marble statue, Marian Hazelton glided to the back of Katy's chair, pressing both her hands upon it, and leaning over Katy so that her eyes too were fixed upon the little face, from which they never turned but once, and that when the clergyman's voice was heard asking for a name. There was an instant's silence, and Katy's lips began to move, when one of Marian's hands was laid upon her head, while the other took in its own the limp, while baby fingers, and Marian's voice was very steady in its tone as it said: "Genevra."

"Yes, Genevra," Katy whispered, and then the solemn words were heard: "Genevra, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost."

Softly the baptismal waters fell upon the pale forehead, and at their touch the little Genevra's eyes unclosed, the waxen fingers withdrew themselves from Marian's grasp, and again sought the mother's cheek, resting there for an instant; while a smile broke around the baby lips, which tried to say "Mam-ma." Then the hand fell back, down upon Marian's, the soft eyes closed, the limbs grew rigid, the shadow of death grew deeper, and while the prayer was said, and Marian's tears fell with Katy's upon the brow where the baptismal waters were not dried, the angel came, and when the prayer was ended, Morris, who knew what the rest did not, took the lifeless form from Katy's lap, and whispered to her gently: "Katy, your baby is dead!"

An hour later, and the sweet little creature, which had been a sunbeam in that house for a few happy days, lay upon the bed where Katy said it must be laid; its form shrouded in the christening robe which Grandma Cameron had bought, flowers upon its pillow, flowers upon its bosom, flowers in its hands, which Marian had put there; for Marian's was the mind which thought of everything concerning the dead child; and Helen, as she watched her, wondered at the mighty love which showed itself in every lineament of her face, the blue veins swelling in her forehead, her eyes bloodshot, and her lips shut firmly together, as if it were by mere strength of will that she kept back the scalding tears as she dressed the little Genevra. They spoke of that name in the kitchen when the first great shock was over, and Helen explained why it had been Katy's choice. Poor stricken Katy, it was Morris' task to comfort her—Morris, who sat by her holding the hot, feverish hand she had placed in his, and telling her of the blessed Savior who loved the little children while here on earth, and to whom her darling had surely gone.

"Safe in His arms it would not come back if it could," he said, "and neither would you have it."

But Katy was the mother, and human love could not so soon submit, but went out after the lost one with a piteous agonizing wail, which hurt Morris cruelly.

"Oh, I want my baby back. I know she is safe, but I want her back. She was my life—all I had to love," Katy moaned, rocking to and fro in this first hour of her bereavement.

"You forget your husband," Morris said. "You have him left, and husbands, I supposed, were dearer than one's children."

"Yes," Katy answered, "I have Wilford, and am glad of that; but he will blame me so much for bringing baby here to die. He will say it was my fault; and that I can't bear. I know it was, know I killed my baby; but I did not mean to. I would give my life for hers, if like her I was ready," and into Katy's face there came a look of fear which Morris failed to understand, not knowing Wilford as well as Katy knew him.

Surely no man could reproach the half-crazed creature, who all that night sat by the bedside of her dead child, sleeping a little in her chair, but obtaining no real rest, so that by the morning her face was like some white rose on which a fierce storm has beaten, breaking off its petals and crushing out its life. At nine o'clock there came to her a telegram. Wilford had reached New York and would be in Silverton that afternoon, accompanied by Bell. At this last Marian Hazelton caught eagerly as an excuse for what she intended doing. She could not remain there after Wilford came, nor was it necessary. Her task was done, or would be when she had finished the wreath and cross of flowers she was making for the coffin. Laying them on baby's pillow, Marian went in quest of Helen, to whom she explained that as Bell Cameron was coming, and the house would be full, she had decided upon going to West Silverton, especially as she wished to see the lady with whom she once boarded, and who had been so kind to her.

"I might stay," she added, as Helen began to protest, "but you do not need me. I have done all I can, and would rather go where I can be quiet for a little."

To this last argument there could be no demur, and so the same carriage which at ten o'clock went for Wilford Cameron carried Marian Hazelton to the village where she preferred being left.

* * * * *

In much anxiety and distress Wilford Cameron read the telegram announcing baby's illness.

"At Silverton!" he said. "How can that be when the child was at New London?" and he glanced at the words:

"Your child is dying at Silverton. Come at once.

"M. GRANT."

There could be no mistake, and Wilford's face grew dark, for he guessed the truth, censuring Katy much, but censuring her family more. They, of course, had encouraged her in the plan of taking her child from New London, where it was doing so well, and this was the result. Wilford was proud of his daughter now, and during the few weeks he had been with it the little thing had found a strong place in his love. Many times he had thought of it during his journey West, indulging in bright anticipations of the coming winter, when he would have it home again. It would not be in his way now. On the contrary, it would add much to his luxurious home, and the young father's heart bounded as Wilford Cameron had never believed his heart could bound, with thoughts of the beautiful baby as he had last seen it in Katy's arms, crowing its good-by to him and trying to lisp his name, its sweet voice haunting him for weeks, and making him a softer, better man, who did not frown impatiently as he used to do upon the children in the cars, but who took notice of them all, even laying his hand once on a little curly head which reminded him of baby's.

Alas for him, he little dreamed of the great shock in store for him. The child was undoubtedly very sick, he said, but that it could die was not possible; and so, though he made ready to hasten to it, he did withhold his opinion of the rashness, as he termed it, which had brought it to such peril.

"Had Katy obeyed me it would not have happened," he said, pacing up and down the parlor and preparing to say more, when Bell came to Katy's aid, and lighting furiously upon him, asked what he meant by blaming his wife so much.

"For my part," she said, "I think there has been too much fault-finding and dictation from the very day of the child's birth till now, and if God takes it, as he may, I shall think it a judgment upon you. First you were half vexed with Katy because it was not a boy, as if she were to blame; then you did not like it because it was not more promising and fair; next it was in your way, and so you sent it off, never considering Katy any more than if she were a mere automaton, to turn which way you said. Then you must needs forbid her taking it home to her own family, as if they had no right, no interest in it. I tell you, Will, it is not all Cameron—there is some Barlow blood in its veins—Aunt Betsy Barlow's, too, and you cannot wash it out. Katy had a right to take her own child where she pleased, and you are not a man if you censure her for it, as I see in your eyes you mean to do. Suppose it had stayed in New London and been struck with lightning—you would have been to blame, of course, according to your own view of things."

There was too much truth in Bell's remarks for Wilford to retort, even had he been disposed, and he contented himself with a haughty toss of his head as she left the room to get herself in readiness for the journey she insisted upon taking. Wilford was glad she was going, as her presence at Silverton would relieve him of the awkward embarrassment he always felt when there; and magnanimously forgiving her for the plainness of her speech, he was the most attentive of brothers until Silverton was reached and he found Dr. Grant waiting for him. Something in his face, as he came forward to meet them, startled both Wilford and Bell, the latter of whom asked quickly:

"Is the baby better?"

"Baby is dead," was the brief reply, and Wilford staggered back against the doorpost, where he leaned a moment for support in that first great shock for which he was not prepared.

"Dead," he repeated, "our baby dead," and Morris was glad that he said our, as it indicated a thought of Katy as a mutual sharer in the loss.

Upon the doorstep Bell sat down, crying quietly, for she had loved the little child, and she listened anxiously while Morris repeated the particulars of its illness and then spoke of Katy's reproaching herself so bitterly for having brought it from New London. "She seems entirely crushed," he continued, when they were driving toward the farmhouse. "For a few hours I trembled for her reason, while the fear that you might reproach her added much to the poignancy of her grief."

Morris said this very calmly, as if it were not what he had all the while intended saying, and his eye turned toward Wilford, whose lips were compressed with the emotion he was evidently trying to control. It was Bell who spoke first. Bell who said impulsively; "Poor Katy, I knew she would feel so, but it is unnecessary, for none but a savage would reproach her now, even if she were in fault."

Morris blessed Bell Cameron in his heart, knowing how much influence her words would have upon her brother, who brushed away the first tear he had shed, and tried to say that "of course she was not to blame."

They were in sight of the farmhouse now, and Bell, with her city ideas, was looking curiously at it, mentally pronouncing it a nicer, pleasanter place than she had supposed, inasmuch as it reminded her of the description she had read of the Virginia farmhouse, where a young officer was encamped for a few days, an officer who wore a lieutenant's uniform and who signed himself as Bob. It was very quiet about the house, and old Whitey's neigh as Morris' span of bays came up was the only sound which greeted them. In the woodshed door Uncle Ephraim sat smoking his clay pipe and likening the feathery waves which curled above his head to the little soul so recently gone upward, while by his side, upon a log of wood, holding a pan of the luscious peaches she was slicing up for tea, sat a woman whom Bell knew at once for Aunt Betsy Barlow, thinking more of the peaches than of the old lady who, pan in hand, came forward to met her, curtseying very low when introduced by Morris, and asking to be excused from shaking hands, inasmuch as hers were not fit to be touched. Bell's quick eye took her in at a glance, from her clean spotted gown to her plain muslin cap tied with a black ribbon, put on that day with a view to mourning, and then darted off to Uncle Ephraim, who won her heart at once when she heard how his voice trembled as he took Wilford's hand and said so pityingly, so father-like: "Young man, this is a sad day for you and you have my sympathy, for I remember well how my heart ached when, on just such a day as this, my only child lay dead as yours is lying."

Every muscle of Wilford's face quivered then, but he was too proud to show all that he felt, and he was glad when Helen appeared in the door, as that diverted his mind somewhat, and he greeted her most cordially, even stooping down and kissing her smooth forehead, a thing he had never done before. But sorrow is a great softener and Wilford was very sorry, feeling his loss more here where everything was so quiet, so suggestive of death.

"Where is Katy?" he asked.

"She is sleeping for the first time since the baby died. She is in here with the child. She will stay nowhere else," Helen said, opening softly the door of the bedroom and motioning Wilford in.

With hushed breath and a beating heart, Wilford stepped across the threshold and Helen closed the door, leaving him alone with the living and the dead. Pure and beautiful as some fair blossom, the dead child lay upon the bed, the curls of golden hair clustering about its head, and on its lips the smile which had settled there when it tried to say "mamma"—its dimpled hands folded upon its breast, where lay the cross of flowers which Marian Hazelton had made—flowers upon its pillow, flowers around its head, flowers upon its shroud, flowers everywhere, and itself the fairest flower of all, Wilford thought as he stood gazing at it and then let his eye move on to where poor, tired, worn-out Katy had crept up so close beside it that her breath touched the marble cheek and her own disordered hair rested upon the pillow of her child. Even in her sleep her tears kept dropping from the long eyelashes, and the pale lips quivered in a grieved, touching way. Hard indeed would Wilford have been had he cherished one bitter thought against the wife so wounded. He could not when he saw her, but no one ever knew just what passed through his mind during the half hour he sat there beside her, scarcely stirring and not daring to kiss his child lest he should awaken her. He could hear the ticking of his watch and the beating of his heart as he waited for the first sound which should herald Katy's waking.

Suddenly there was a low, gasping moan, and Katy's eyes unclosed and rested on her husband. He was bending over her in an instant, and her arms were around his neck, while she said to him so sadly:

"Our baby is dead—you've nobody left but me; and oh! Wilford, you will not blame me bringing baby here? I did not think she would die. I'd give my life for hers if that would bring her back. Say, Wilford, would you rather it was me lying as baby lies, and she here in your arms?"

"No, Katy," Wilford answered, and by his voice Katy knew that she was wholly forgiven, crying on his neck in a plaintive, piteous way, while Wilford soothed and pitied and caressed, feeling subdued and humbled, and we must confess it, feeling too how very good and generous he was to be thus forbearing, when but for Katy's act of disobedience they might not now be childless!

* * * * *

With a great gust of tears Bell Cameron bent over the little form, and then enfolded Katy in a more loving embrace than he had ever given her before; but whatever she might have said was prevented by the arrival of the coffin and the confusion which followed.

Much Wilford regretted that New York was so far away, for a city coffin was more suitable, he thought, for a child of his, than the one which Dr. Grant had ordered. But that was really of less consequence than the question where should the child be buried? A costly monument at Greenwood was in accordance with his ideas, but all things indicated a contemplated burial there in the country churchyard, and sorely perplexed he called on Bell as the only Cameron at hand, to know what he should do.

"Do just as Katy prefers," was Bell's reply, as she led him to the coffin and pointed to the name: "Little Genevra Cameron, aged nine months and twenty days."

"What is it, Wilford—what is the matter?" she asked, as her brother turned whiter than his child, and struck his hand upon his head as if a blow had fallen there.

Had "Genevra Lambert, aged twenty-two," met his eye, he could not have been more startled than he was; but soon rallying, he said to Morris, who came near:

"The child was baptized then?"

"Yes, baptized Genevra. That was Katy's choice, I understand," Morris replied, and Wilford bowed his head, wishing the Genevra across the sea might know that his child bore her name.

"Perhaps she does," he thought, and his heart grew warm with the fancy that possibly in that other world, whose existence he never really doubted, the Genevra he had wronged would care for his child, if children there need care. "She will know it is mine at least," he said, and with a thoughtful face he went in quest of Katy, whom he found sobbing by the side of the mourning garments just sent in for her inspection.

Wilford was averse to black. It would not become Katy, he feared, and it would be an unanswerable reason for her remaining closely home for the entire winter.

"What's this?" he asked, lifting the crape veil and dropping it again with an impatient gesture as Helen replied: "It is Katy's mourning veil."

Contrary to his expectations, black was becoming to Katy, who looked like a pure white lily, as, leaning on Wilford's arm next day, she stood by the grave where they were burying her child.

Wilford had spoken to her of Greenwood, but she had begged so hard that he had given up that idea, suggesting next, as more in accordance with city custom, that she remain at home while he only followed to the grave; but from this Katy recoiled in such distress that he gave up too, and bore, magnanimously, as he thought, the sight of all the Barlows standing around that grave, alike mourners with himself, and all a right to be there. Wilford felt his loss deeply, and his heart ached to its very core as he heard the gravel rattling down upon the coffin lid which covered the beautiful child he had loved so much. But amid it all he never for a moment forgot that he was Wilford Cameron, and infinitely superior to the crowd around him—except, indeed, his wife, his sister, Dr. Grant, and Helen. He could bear to see them sorry, and feel that by their sorrow they honored the memory of his child. But for the rest—the village herd, with the Barlows in their train—he had no affinity, and his manner was as haughty and distant as ever as he passed through their midst back to the carriage, which took him again to the farmhouse.



CHAPTER XXXIII.

AFTER THE FUNERAL.

Had there been a train back to New York that afternoon Wilford would most certainly have suggested going, but as there was none he passed the time as well as he could, finding Bell a great help to him, but wondering that she could assimilate so readily with such people, declaring herself in love with the farmhouse, and saying she should like to remain there for weeks, if the days were all as sunny as this, the dahlias as gorgeously bright, and the peaches by the well as delicious and ripe. To these the city girl took readily, visiting them the last thing before retiring, while Wilford found her there when he arose next morning, her dress and slippers nearly spoiled with the heavy dew, and her hands full of the fresh fruit which Aunt Betsy knocked from the tree with a quilting rod; her dress pinned around her waist, and disclosing a petticoat scrupulously clean, but patched and mended with so many different patterns and colors that the original ground was lost, and none could tell whether it had been red or black, buff or blue. Between Aunt Betsy and Bell the most amicable feeling had existed ever since the older lady had told the younger how all the summer long she had been drying fruit, "thimble-berries, blue-berries and huckleberries" for the soldiers, and how she was now drying peaches for Willard Buxton—once their hired man. These she should tie up in a salt bag, and put in the next box sent by the society of which she seemed to be head and front, "kind of fust directress," she said, and Bell was interested at once, for among the soldiers down by the Potomac was one who carried with him the whole of Bell Cameron's heart; and who for a few days had tarried at just such a dwelling as the farmhouse, writing back to her such pleasant descriptions of it, with its fresh grass and shadowy trees, that she had longed to be there too. So it was through this page of romance and love that Bell looked at the farmhouse and its occupants, preferring good Aunt Betsy because she seemed the most interested in the soldiers, working as soon as breakfast was over upon the peaches, and kindly furnishing her best check apron, together with pan and knife for Bell, who offered her assistance, notwithstanding Wilford's warning that the fruit would stain her hands, and his advice that she had better be putting up her things for going home.

"She was not going that day," she said, point-blank, and as Katy too had asked to stay a little longer, Wilford was compelled to yield, and taking his hat sauntered off toward Linwood; while Katy went listlessly into the kitchen, where Bell Cameron sat, her tongue moving much faster than her hands, which pared so slowly and cut away so much of the juicy pulp, besides making so frequent journeys to her mouth, that Aunt Betsy looked in alarm at the rapidly disappearing fruit, wishing to herself that "Miss Cameron had not listed."

But Miss Cameron had enlisted, and so had Bob, or rather he had gone to do his duty, and as she worked, she repeated to Helen the particulars of his going, telling how, when the war first broke out, and Sumter was bombarded, Rob, who, from long association with Southern men at West Point, had imbibed many of their ideas, was very sympathetic with the rebelling States, gaining the cognomen of a secessionist, and once actually thinking of casting in his lot with that side rather than the other. But the remembrance of a little incident saved him, she said. The remembrance of a queer old lady whom he met in the cars, and who, at parting, held her wrinkled hand above his head in benediction, charging him not to go against the flag, and promising her prayers for his safety if found on the side of the Union.

"I wish you could hear Bob tell the story, the funny part, I mean," she continued, narrating, as well as she could, the particulars of Lieutenant Bob's meeting with Aunt Betsy, who, as the story progressed and she recognized herself in the queer old Yankee woman, who shook hands with the conductor and was going to law about a sheep pasture, dropped her head lower and lower over her pan of peaches, while a scarlet flush spread itself all over her thin face, but changed into a grayish white as Bell concluded with "Bob says the memory of that hand lifted above his head haunted him day and night, during the period of his uncertainty, and was at last the means of saving him from treachery to his country."

"Thank God!" came involuntarily from Aunt Betsy's quivering lips, and, looking up, Bell saw the great tears running down her cheeks, tears which she wiped away with her arm, while she said faintly: "That old woman, who made a fool of herself in the cars, was me!"

"You, Miss Barlow, you!" Bell exclaimed, forgetting in her astonishment to carry to her mouth the luscious half peach she had intended for that purpose, and dropping it untasted into the pan, while Katy, who had been listening with some considerable interest, came quickly forward, saying: "You, Aunt Betsy! When were you in New York, and why did I never know it?"

It could not be kept back, and, unmindful of Bell, Helen explained to Katy as well as she could the circumstances of Aunt Betsy's visit to New York the previous winter.

"And she never let me know it, or come to see me, because—because—" Katy hesitated, and looked at Bell, who said, pertly: "Because Will is so abominably proud, and would have made such a fuss. Don't spoil a story for relations' sake, I beg," and the young lady laughed good humoredly, restoring peace to all save Katy, whose face wore a troubled look, and who soon stole away to her mother, whom she questioned further with regard to a circumstance which seemed so mysterious to her.

"Miss Barlow," Bell said, when Katy was gone, "you will forgive one for repeating that story as I did. Of course I had no idea it was you of whom I was talking."

Bell was very earnest, and her eyes looked pleadingly upon Aunt Betsy, who answered her back: "There's nothing to forgive. You only told the truth. I did make an old fool of myself, but if I helped that boy to a right decision, my journey did some good, and I ain't sorry now if I did go to the playhouse. I confessed that to the sewing circle, and Mrs. Deacon Bannister ain't seemed the same toward me since, but I don't care. I beat her on the election to first directress of the Soldiers' Aid. She didn't run half as well as me. That chap you call Bob, is he anything to you? Is he your beau?"