the place an' all you kin save, when we are
gone; but that dear little thing----Givin' her money to that blind
child, and all----"

Mrs. Day broke down and "sniveled." At least, that is what her husband
would have called it under some circumstances, and crying did not
beautify Mrs. Day's fat face. But for some reason the old man came
close to her and put his arms about her bulbous shoulders.

"There, there, 'Mira! don't you cry about it. You sartainly have got a
good heart. An' I won't say nothin' agin' your savin' for the gal.
Mebbe she'll need your savin's, too. Broxton Day is too free-handed,
and he'll have his ups and downs again, p'r'aps. Anyhow, whatever you
say is right, is right, 'Mira," and he kissed her suddenly in a
shamedfaced sort of way, and then hurried out.

The good woman sat there in her kitchen, with shining eyes, blushing
like a girl. She touched tenderly her wet cheek where her husband had
laid his lips.

"He--he wouldn't ha' done that two year ago, I don't believe!" she
murmured.

She picked up the ever-present story paper; but her mind was not
attuned to imaginary romance that morning. And there were the
breakfast dishes waiting----

She went about her work briskly, and singing. Somehow it seemed as
though _real_ romance had come into the old Day house, and into Aunt
'Mira's life!

The weeks rolled on toward summer. A fortnight after little Lottie and
Miss 'Rill had gone to Boston a letter came from the specialist to
Hopewell Drugg. The operation on the child's eyes had been performed
almost as soon as she had arrived at the sanitarium; now he could
announce that it was successful. Lottie could see and, barring some
accident, would be a bright-eyed girl and woman.

Already, the doctor urged, she was fit to go into the school for the
deaf and dumb in which such wonderful miracles were achieved for the
afflicted. The good surgeon, learning from Miss 'Rill the
circumstances of the child's being brought to him, had subscribed two
hundred dollars toward Lottie's tuition and board in the school for the
deaf and dumb.

It was joyful news for both Hopewell and Janice. That evening the
storekeeper got out his violin and played his old tunes over and
over--especially "Silver Threads Among the Gold."

"But it sounds more like a hymn of praise tonight," Nelson Haley
whispered in Janice's ear, as they sat on the front porch of the little
shop and listened to the violin.

A week l