ms uttered a little cry of pain. "'Hammering,' Alice?"

"If you'd left it entirely to me," her daughter went on, briskly, "I
believe papa'd already be willing to do anything we want him to."

"That's it; tell me I spoil everything. Well, I won't interfere from now
on, you can be sure of it."

"Please don't talk like that," Alice said, quickly. "I'm old enough to
realize that papa may need pressure of all sorts; I only think it makes
him more obstinate to get him cross. You probably do understand him
better, but that's one thing I've found out and you haven't. There!"
She gave her mother a friendly tap on the shoulder and went to the door.
"I'll hop in and say hello to him now."

As she went, she continued the fastening of her blouse, and appeared in
her father's room with one hand still thus engaged, but she patted his
forehead with the other.

"Poor old papa-daddy!" she said, gaily. "Every time he's better somebody
talks him into getting so mad he has a relapse. It's a shame!"

Her father's eyes, beneath their melancholy brows, looked up at her
wistfully. "I suppose you heard your mother going for me," he said.

"I heard you going for her, too!" Alice laughed. "What was it all
about?"

"Oh, the same danged old story!"

"You mean she wants you to try something new when you get well?" Alice
asked, with cheerful innocence. "So we could all have a lot more money?"

At this his sorrowful forehead was more sorrowful than ever. The deep
horizontal lines moved upward to a pattern of suffering so familiar to
his daughter that it meant nothing to her; but he spoke quietly. "Yes;
so we wouldn't have any money at all, most likely."

"Oh, no!" she laughed, and, finishing with her blouse, patted his cheeks
with both hands. "Just think how many grand openings there must be for
a man that knows as much as you do! I always did believe you could get
rich if you only cared to, papa."

But upon his forehead the painful pattern still deepened. "Don't you
think we've always had enough, the way things are, Alice?"

"Not the way things ARE!" She patted his cheeks again; laughed again.
"It used to be enough, maybe anyway we did skimp along on it--but the
way things are now I expect mama's really pretty practical in her ideas,
though, I think it's a shame for her to bother you about it while you're
so weak. Don't you worry about it, though; just think about other things
till you get strong."

"You know," he said; "you know it is