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her knees beside him, and his hand held hers while the blazing splinter set the pine kindling aflame. Quickly the whole room was aglow with light and warmth, in cheerful contrast to the stormy tumult outside. "Somebody said once," observed Harlan, as they drew their chairs close to the hearth, "that four feet on a fender are sufficient for happiness." "Depends altogether on the feet," rejoined Dorothy, quickly. "I wouldn't want Uncle Ebeneezer sitting here beside me--no disrespect intended to your relation, as such." "Poor old duck," said Harlan, kindly. "Life was never very good to him, and Death took away the only thing he ever loved. "Aunt Rebecca," he continued, feeling her unspoken question. "She died suddenly, when they had been married only three or four weeks." "Like us," whispered Dorothy, for the first time conscious of a tenderness toward the departed Mr. Judson, of Judson Centre. "It was four weeks ago to-day, wasn't it?" he mused, instinctively seeking her hand. "I thought you'd forgotten," she smiled back at him. "I feel like an old married woman, already." "You don't look it," he returned, gently. Few would have called her beautiful, but love brings beauty with it, and Harlan saw an exquisite loveliness in the deep, dark eyes, the brown hair that rippled and shone in the firelight, the smooth, creamy skin, and the sensitive mouth that betrayed every passing mood. "None the less, I am," she went on. "I've grown so used to seeing 'Mrs. James Harlan Carr' on my visiting cards that I've forgotten there ever was such a person as 'Miss Dorothy Locke,' who used to get letters, and go calling when she wasn't too busy, and have things sent to her when she had the money to buy them." "I hope--" Harlan stumbled awkwardly over the words--"I hope you'll never be sorry." "I haven't been yet," she laughed, "and it's four whole weeks. Come, let's go on an exploring expedition. I'm dry both inside and out, and most terribly hungry." Each took a candle and Harlan led the way, in and out of unexpected doors, queer, winding passages, and lonely, untenanted rooms. Originally, the house had been simple enough in structure, but wing after wing had been added until the first design, if it could be dignified by that name, had been wholly obscured. From each room branched a series of apartments--a sitting-room, surrounded by bedrooms, each of which contained two or sometimes three beds. A combined kitch
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