bending above a desk full of correspondence.

At every setting frame there are two operators, for left hand and for
right; and it was Amy's good fortune to have Mary Reese for her comrade,
and a more sunshiny pair of workers could be found nowhere.

For Hallam, also, it had been a busy, happy year. Like Amy, having
begun with the humblest task and smallest wage, he had now advanced to
be bookkeeper in one department, while he still retained his work of
coloring and preparing the patterns for use in the weaving of the famous
Ardsley carpets. He looked a far stronger, healthier lad than of old,
and his disposition to think upon the dark side of things had now no
time to develop, for activity effectually prevents brooding.

Fayette was still a member of the Kaye household, and seemed to belong
there as much as any of the others. He had been busy, too, all the year
through, with his mushroom-raising, his gardening, and now that the
autumn had come round again, with odd jobs at the mill. His deftness
would always procure him employment of some sort, yet only that morning
Mr. Metcalf had remarked to Hallam, confidentially:--

"Queer, but I can never trust 'Bony.' He seems as honest and reliable as
possible for a time, and then, suddenly, he will do something to
disappoint me. I don't like his demeanor toward the 'boss.' Ever since
Mr. Wingate returned, late this summer, and took to coming here every
day, 'Bony' has come too. Have you noticed?"

"I know he comes. I hadn't connected the two comings, however. I guess
he's all right. There's a splendid side to that poor lad's nature, if
you but knew it. Some day, I hope before very long now, he and I are to
surprise the world."

"Why, Hal, you're as gay as a blackbird. What's the surprise, eh? Too
precious to disclose even to me?"

"At present, yes. In a little while, a few days--Heigho!" and the lad
looked significantly toward his crutches, leaning against the desk where
he wrote.

But the superintendent did not observe the glance. His mind was full of
misgiving. Within a day or two he had had occasion to suspect that the
half-wit had some uncanny scheme on hand. The lad's dislike of the old
mill owner appeared to grow with the passage of time. The dull brain
never forgot an injury, and it always seemed to Fayette that Mr. Wingate
had wronged him. From the old days of his "bound out" life on the farm,
when whippings and punishments were of almost daily occurrence, to th