n abiding sense of humour kept him sometimes from being
domineering. Along with divers other qualities it had taken
masterfulness for him at twenty-nine to be superintendent of our
street-railway system, now owned and operated by Northern capitalists.
Likewise it had taken masterfulness for him to distance the field of
Emmy Lou's local admirers within the space of five short months after he
procured his transfer to our town from another town where his company
likewise had traction interests. He showed the same trait in the stand
he presently took with regard to the future status of Aunt Sharley in
the household of which he was to become a member and of which he meant
to be the head.

For moral support--which she very seriously felt she needed--Emmy Lou
took her sister with her on the afternoon when she invaded the kitchen
to break the news to Aunt Sharley. The girls came upon the old woman in
one of her busiest moments. She was elbows deep in a white mass which in
due time would become a batch of the hot biscuits of perfection.
"Auntie," began Emmy Lou in a voice which she tried to make
matter-of-fact, "we've--I've something I want to say to you."

"Ise lissenin', chile," stated the old woman shortly.

"It's this way, Auntie: We think--I mean we're afraid that you're
getting along so in life--getting so old that we----"

"Who say Ise gittin' ole?" demanded Aunt Sharley, and she jerked her
hands out of the dough she was kneading.

"We both think so--I mean we all think so," corrected Emmy Lou.

"Who do you mean by we all? Does you mean dat young Mistah Winslow,
Esquire, late of de North?" Her blazing eyes darted from the face of one
sister to the face of the other, reading their looks. "Uh-huh!" she
snorted. "I mout 'a' knowed he'd be de ver' one to come puttin' sech
notions ez dem in you chillens' haids. Well, ma'am, an' whut, pray, do
he want?" Her words fairly dripped with sarcasm.

"He thinks--in fact we all three do--that because you are getting along
in years--you know you are, Auntie--and because your rheumatism bothers
you so much at times that--that--well, perhaps that we should make a
change in the running of the house. So--so----" She hesitated, then
broke off altogether, anxious though she was to make an end to what she
foresaw must be a painful scene for all three of them. Poor Emmy Lou was
finding this job which she had nerved herself to carry through a
desperately hard job. And Aunt Sharley's attitu