boys came down to dinner, no little white flower
with its diamond dewdrop centre shone on the lapel of either coat. It
had been a work of time to scrub off the paint, and then it took almost
as long to get rid of the turpentine, so that dinner was ready long
before Keith was finally clad in his flannels. "My throat is sore," he
complained to Malcolm at bedtime, but did not mention it to any one else
that night. He sat on the side of his bed a moment before undressing,
with one foot across his knee, staring thoughtfully at the lamp.
Presently, with one shoe in his hand and the other half unlaced, he
hopped over to the dressing-table and stood before it, looking at first
one picture and then another.

Eight different photographs of his mother were ranged along the table
below the wide mirror, some taken in evening dress, some in simple
street costume, and each one so beautiful that it would have been hard
to decide which one had the greatest charm.

"I wish mamma was here to-night," said Keith, softly, with a little
quiver of his lip. "Seems like she's been gone almost always."

He picked up a large Roman locket of beaten silver that lay open on the
table. It held two exquisitely painted miniatures on ivory. One was the
same sweet face that looked out at him from each of the photographs, the
other was his father's. It showed a handsome young fellow with strong,
clean-shaven face, with eyes like Keith's, and the same lordly poise of
the fine head that Malcolm had.

"Good night, papa, good night, mamma!" whispered Keith, touching his
lips hastily to each picture while Malcolm's back was turned. There were
tears in his eyes. Somehow he was so miserably homesick.

Next morning, although Keith's throat was not so sore, he was burning
with fever by the time his lessons were over. Before his grandmother saw
him he was off on his wheel for a long ride, and then, because he was so
hot when he came back, he slipped away to the pond with the pink
bathing-suit under his coat, and took the swim that he had been looking
forward to so long. Nobody knew where he was, and he stayed in the water
until his lips and finger-nails were blue. The morning after that he was
too ill to get up, and Mrs. Maclntyre sent for a doctor.

"He has always been so perfectly well, and seemed to have such a strong
constitution, that I cannot allow myself to believe this will be
anything serious," said Mrs. Maclntyre, but at the end of the third day
he