es. Was he always to stand outside
the banqueting-table, he wondered, and see others feasting while he
hungered.

Now the little speck bounded from the fence, flew down the road to meet
the sleigh, and jumped in by the driver's side.

"I knew you'd come to-night," Rodman cried eagerly. "I told Aunt Boynton
you'd come."

"How is she, well as common?"

"No, not a bit well since yesterday morning, but Mrs. Mason says it's
nothing worse than a cold. Mrs. Mason has just gone home, and we've had
a grand house-cleaning to-day. She's washed and ironed and baked, and
we've put Aunt Boynton in clean sheets and pillow-cases, and her room's
nice and warm, and I carried the eat in and put it on her bed to keep
her company while I came to watch for you. Aunt Boynton let Mrs. Mason
braid her hair, and seemed to like her brushing it. It's been dreadful
lonesome, and oh! I am glad you came back, Ivory. Did you find any more
spruce gum where you went this time?"

"Pounds and pounds, Rod; enough to bring me in nearly a hundred dollars.
I chanced on the greatest place I've found yet. I followed the wake of
an old whirlwind that had left long furrows in the forest,--I've told
you how the thing works,--and I tracked its course by the gum that had
formed wherever the trees were wounded. It's hard, lonely work, Rod, but
it pays well."

"If I could have been there, maybe we could have got more. I'm good at
shinning up trees."

"Yes, sometime we'll go gum-picking together. We'll climb the trees like
a couple of cats, and take our knives and serape off the precious lumps
that are worth so much money to the druggists. You've let down the bars,
I see."

"'Cause I knew you'd come to-night," said Rodman. "I felt it in my
bones. We're going to have a splendid supper."

"Are we? That's good news." Ivory tried to make his tone bright and
interested, though his heart was like a lump of lead in his breast.
"It's the least I can do for the poor little chap," he thought, "when
he stays as caretaker in this lonely spot.--I wonder if I hadn't better
drive into the barn, Rod, and leave the harness on Nick till I go in and
see mother? Guess I will."

"She's hot, Aunt Boynton is, hot and restless, but Mrs. Mason thinks
that's all."

Ivory found his mother feverish, and her eyes were unnaturally bright;
but she was clear in her mind and cheerful, too, sitting up in bed to
breathe the better, while the Maltese cat snuggled under her arm and
purred