little misunderstanding and--"

Into the little old lady's ivory cheek crept a small, bright,
blush-spot.

"Oh, you had a little misunderstanding," she repeated softly. "A
little quarrel? Oh, is that why Molly has been crying so much ever
since she came home?"

Very gently she reached out her tiny, blue-veined hand, and turned
Stanton's big body around so that the lamp-light smote him squarely on
his face.

"Are you a good boy?" she asked. "Are you good enough for--my--little
Molly?"

Impulsively Stanton grabbed her small hands in his big ones, and
raised them very tenderly to his lips.

[Illustration: "Are you a good boy?" she asked]

"Oh, little Molly's little grandmother," he said; "nobody on the face
of this snow-covered earth is good enough for your Molly, but won't
you give me a chance? Couldn't you please give me a chance? Now--this
minute? Is she so very ill?"

"No, she's not so very ill, that is, she's not sick in bed," mused the
old lady waveringly. "She's well enough to be sitting up in her big
chair in front of her open fire."

"Big chair--open fire?" quizzed Stanton. "Then, are there two chairs?"
he asked casually.

"Why, yes," answered the little-grandmother in surprise.

"And a mantelpiece with a clock on it?" he probed.

The little-grandmother's eyes opened wide and blue with astonishment.

"Yes," she said, "but the clock hasn't gone for forty years!"

"Oh, great!" exclaimed Stanton. "Then won't you please--please--I tell
you it's a case of life or death--won't you _please_ go right upstairs
and sit down in that extra big chair--and not say a word or anything
but just wait till I come? And of course," he said, "it wouldn't be
good for you to run upstairs, but if you could hurry just a little I
should be _so_ much obliged."

As soon as he dared, he followed cautiously up the unfamiliar stairs,
and peered inquisitively through the illuminating crack of a loosely
closed door.

The grandmother as he remembered her was dressed in some funny sort of
a dullish purple, but peeping out from the edge of one of the chairs
he caught an unmistakable flutter of blue.

Catching his breath he tapped gently on the woodwork.

Round the big winged arm of the chair a wonderful, bright aureole of
hair showed suddenly.

"Come in," faltered Molly's perplexed voice.

All muffled up in his great fur-coat he pushed the door wide open and
entered boldly.

"It's only Carl," he said. "Am I interrupting