sit was over, the table achieved a patterned whiteness and a
general festive appearance. Old Mrs. Bray donned the gray-and-lavender
every afternoon, and Myra bloomed out in pink print. She scarcely ever
went abroad now, but for all that, her world was infinitely widened.
Once Marvin, dangling from two spread fingers a tiny yoke, inquired
doubtfully, "Do you think it's big enough to go round his neck?"

He was always urging her to have help in, and not to tire herself out.
But curiously, he never noted the pink print any more than if it had
been dull slate. That had not been his pa's way; and it was not his way.
But he was good to her. What more could a woman ask?

After Nell came, he felt aggrieved--quite useless and in the way. The
women were always displaying things--digging them out from the bottoms
of drawers--clouds of soft, white things, with here and there a rift of
color in tassel or tufting.

There came a night when he sat alone. In the beginning, he had tried to
read--he picked up her woman's magazine, eyeing it curiously, that these
silly, floppy sheets should hold, as they did, women's eyes. There were
pictures in it--always pictures--pictured embraces, with words beneath.
"How beautiful you are! I love you--I love you! How beautiful you are!"
Always harping on the same thing--love and beauty. As if life were a
sentimental thing like that!

He flung it down. How could he stay his mind on such stuff, when
Myry--when Myry--

Nell, important and managerial, occasionally came out and elbowed him
about in some mysterious search. At such times, old Mrs. Bray, done up
for the night in a highly flowered and mantle-like garment, came
creeping inquiringly in.

"Now, Nell--you know what Myry told ye--if you was to fergit now--"

"All right, Mother. I won't forget."

"You know where to find 'em--"

"Yes, I know where to find 'em."

"Now, Nell, I promised Myry--"

"What did you promise Myry?" Marvin flared in sudden jealousy. Both
women eyed him, as from a great and unattainable height. Then Nell's
capable back disappeared beyond Myry's door; and his mother's little old
grotesque and woolly figure was swallowed up by the black hall.

Again he took up the magazine. Again looked at the picture. Again,
scarcely seeing them, he read the words. Again he sat; and again Nell
elbowed him importantly, and his mother in her snail-like wrappings,
came creeping in to remind Nell--

When Doc Bradley came out, at first