up at you?"

"Elmira's a good girl," Jerome repeated.

Lawrence had to be contented with that. He went on, to tell Jerome
his plans with regard to the engagement between himself and Elmira.
He was clearly much under the wise influence of his mother. "Mother
says, on Elmira's account as well as my own, I had better not pay
regular attention to her," he said, ruefully, yet with submission.
"She says to go to see her occasionally, in a way that won't make
talk, and wait. She's coming to see Elmira herself. I've talked it
over with her, and she's agreed to it all, as, of course, she would.
Some girls wouldn't, but she--Jerome, I don't believe when we've been
married fifty years that your sister will ever have refused to do one
single thing I thought best for her."

Jerome nodded with a puzzled and wistful expression, puzzled because
of any man's so exalting his sister when Lucina Merritt was in the
world, wistful at the sight of a joy which he must deny himself.

When he went home that night he saw by the way his mother and sister
looked up when he entered the room that they were wondering if
Lawrence had told him the news, and what he thought of it. Elmira's
face was so eager that he did not wait. "Yes, I've seen him," he
said.

Elmira blushed, and quivered, and bent closer over her work.

"What did I tell you?" said his mother, with a kind of tentative
triumph.

"You don't know now what Doctor Prescott will say," said Jerome.

"Lawrence says his mother thinks his father will come round
by-and-by, when he gets started in his profession; he always liked
Elmira."

"Well, there's one thing," said Jerome, "and that is--of course you
and Elmira are not under my control, but no sister of mine will ever
enter any family where she is not welcome, with my consent."

"Lawrence says he knows his father will be willing by-and-by," said
Elmira, tremulously.

"You know Doctor Prescott always liked your sister," said Ann
Edwards.

"Well, if he likes her well enough to have her marry his son, it's
all right," said Jerome, and went out to wash his hands and face
before supper.

That night Lawrence stole in for a short call. When Elmira came
up-stairs after he had gone, Jerome, who had been reading in his
room, opened his door and called her in.

"Look here, Elmira," said he, "I don't want you to think I don't want
you to be happy. I do."

Elmira held out her arms towards him with an involuntary motion. "Oh,
Jerome!" s