Year: 1873

HOuSt ana as Tor loneliness. tnerI


was no chance for that, while there


were so many travelling clergymen K


be ''put up" and neighbors going


away and wanting to leave the chill


dren few days, end distant relative.


needing home littlewhile. So Miss


Plumtree's days glided swiftly and


happily by, very happily she thought


and she used to have q little season


Of thinking about it every evening


as the twilight gathered. sitting alone


III her own room, with her face pressed


close against the window that looked


out upon the lawn. Some maiden


sisters, left with such store Of silver
and household valuablps as Miss
I Plumtree, would have sArunk with


horror from room on the frst-foor.


with door opening directly out up


on the gladiolus bed; but it was


beautiful to Miss Plumtree. since an


accident she had met with, a few


years before, though it had left her
as good as new in all other respects,


had made going up and down stairs
a troublesome affair.


81 don't know what ever should
have dore if it hadn't been for this
room lying just so, she said one
evening, as the hour came and she
drew her little arm chair to the win
dow and took her seat; and then
from thinking about the room. she
fell slowly into 4 reveric, until as the
gladiolus bed grew more and more in
distinct outside, the ghost oftime and
things that had been stepped soIwlv
out of the twilight Of the past and
ranged themselves one by one before
her. How happy they had all been
together in those days gone by, And
then when her mother was taken
away, how the rest clung together.
she and her father and Jack How
proud she was Of Jack, ana how
satisfied that the will left everything
to him, with the understanding that
he was always to take care Of her as
ner father had. And then Jack be-
gan to 60 wrong, dreadfully wrong.
the neighbors said, and when her
father Threatened di~inh"riJ nm.
he got possession Of the will and ran
away. She did not know what she
Shouid have done then. if it Lad not
been for her father. So kindly ordered
that they were left to each other!
There might have been one more.
one handsomer and dearcr even than
Jack, but her father, so kind to her
and 50 hard to others. had driven
him away too; had believed some.
thing false of him, and swoIn that
never 50 long as he lived should he
see his daughters face with his con-
sent. So he had gone away too, not
like Jack, in passion, but sorrowtul
enough, and Miss Plumtrcc did not
suppose he would ever come back. .
And now even her father WAS taken. .
but She had the home with plenty of .
means to keep it up, AMI cousin Peri !,
winkle spending the winter with her


that had all been arranged Except
cousin Periwinkle) by the new will .
made after poor dear Jack ran away
and she thought-yery likely by
next summcr-hark, What football
was that on the dry grass, and what
form moving stealthily over the lawn
in the starlight?


Miss Plumtree pressed her face
closer to the pane-the figure passed f,
out Of sight, then turned and came
slowly down the path again. She
sprang to the door and opened it.


Jack! Dear Jack" But the fig
ure was gone and there was no an
swer. In another moment she had

the stairs without thinking
it was long or not, and stood
in the passage-way that divided cous-
in Periwinkle's room from the spare
chamber, with a pair of.the best linen
sheets in her hand. Dear cousin
Periwinkle," she exclaimed, as well
as she could, with great humping at
her heart. Jack has come home. /:
Don't tell me | am mistaken. ] I,
shoulc know him if l only saw his
shadow, He would not come when t
| called him, but that was only one I
If his odd ways. So l am just going
20 get his room ready without saying
to the servants, for | know
hell be coming pretty soon, to say
ne forgives me for everything, and will
ct me share with him just as if moth t
l., I