time we'll send the boys off before dinner, and have things all nice
and quiet. In October, say, when the trees are so pretty. I don't know
but what that's my favorite time of all the year!"

Margaret looked at her as if she found something new in the tired,
bright face. She could not understand why her mother--still too
heated to commence eating her dinner--should radiate so definite an
atmosphere of content, as she sat back a little breathless, after the
flurry of serving. She herself felt injured and sore, not at the mere
disappointment it caused her to put off John Tendon's visit, but
because she felt more acutely than ever to-night the difference
between his position and her own.

"Something nice has happened, Mother?" she hazarded, entering with an
effort into the older woman's mood.

"Nothing special." Her mother's happy eyes ranged about the circle of
young faces. "But it's so lovely to have you here, and to have Ju
coming to-morrow," she said. "I just wish Daddy could build a house
for each one of you, as you marry and settle down, right around our
house in a circle, as they say people do sometimes in the Old World. I
think then I'd have nothing in life to wish for!"

"Oh, Mother--in Weston!" Margaret said hopelessly, but her mother
did not catch it.

"Not, Mark," she went on hastily and earnestly, "that I'm not more
than grateful to God for all His goodness, as it is! I look at other
women, and I wonder, I wonder--what I have done to be so blessed!
Mark--" her face suddenly glowed, she leaned a little toward her