ome picture thrown
against it. Then she saw her father coming into the yard with his
arms full of parcels, and she was out of her chair and at the
kitchen door to meet him.

Andrew had brought as usual some dainties for his darling. He
watched Ellen unwrap the various parcels, not smiling as usual, but
with a curious knitting of his forehead and pitiful compression of
mouth. When she had finished and ran into the other room to show a
great orange to her aunt, he drew a heavy sigh that was almost a
groan. His wife coming in from the kitchen with a dish heard him,
and looked at him with quick anxiety, though she spoke in a merry,
rallying way.

"For the land sake, Andrew Brewster, what be you groanin' that way
for?" she cried out.

Andrew's tense face did not relax; he strove to push past her
without a word, but Fanny stood before him. "Now, look at here,
Andrew," said she, "you 'ain't goin' to walk off with a face like
that, unless I know what the matter is. Are you sick?"

"No, I ain't sick, Fanny," Andrew said; then in a low voice, "Let me
go, I will tell you by-and-by."

"No, Andrew, you have got to tell me now. I'm goin' to know whatever
has happened."

"Wait till after supper, Fanny."

"No, I can't wait. Look here, Andrew, you are my husband, and there
ain't no trouble that can come to you in this world that I can't
bear, except not knowin'. You've got to tell me what the matter is."

"Well, keep quiet till after supper, then," said Andrew. Then
suddenly he leaned his face close to her and whispered with a hiss
of tragedy, "Lloyd's shut down."

Fanny recoiled and looked at him.

"When?"

"The foreman gave notice to-night."

"For how long? Did he say?"

"Oh, till business got better--same old story. Unless I'm mistaken,
Lloyd's will be shut down all winter."

"Well, it ain't so bad for us as for some," said Fanny. Both pride
and a wish to cheer her husband induced her to say that. She did not
like to think that, after the fine marriage she had made, she needed
to be as distressed at a temporary loss of employment as others.
Then, too, that look of overhanging melancholy in Andrew's face
alarmed her; she felt that she must drive it away at any cost.

"Seems to me it's bad enough for anybody," said Andrew, morosely.

"Now, Andrew, you know it ain't. Here we own the house clear, and
we've got that money in the savings-bank, and all that's your
mother's is yours in the end. Of course we ain't alway