more than I could stand, and, feeling less than a worm, I
turned my face into her breast and wailed. Now who would have thought
that girl could dance as she did?

By this time I was in such a solution of grief that I would soon have
had to be sopped up with a sponge if Pet hadn't run in all bubbling
over. Happiness has a habit of not even acknowledging the presence of
grief, and Pet didn't seem to see our red noses, crushed draperies and
generally damp atmosphere.

"Molly," she said with a deliciously young giggle, "Tom says you are to
send him two guineas to spend getting the brass band to polish up before
the six o'clock train, by which your Mr. Bennett comes. He has spent a
guinea already to induce them to clean up their uniforms, and it cost
him five pounds to bail the cornettist out of gaol for roost robbing. He
says I am to tell you that, as this is your festivity, you ought at
least to pay the piper. Hurry up, he's waiting for me, and here's the
kiss he told me to put on your left ear!"

"I suppose you delivered that kiss straight from where he gave it to
you, Pettie dear," I had the spirit to say as I went over to the desk
for my purse.

"Why, Molly, you know me better than that!" she exclaimed from behind a
perfect rose cloud of blushes.

"I know Tom better than I do you," I answered as she fled with the money
in her hand. I looked at Ruth Clinton and we both laughed. It is true
that a broader sympathy is one of the by-products of sorrow, and a week
ago I might have resented Pet to a marked degree instead of giving her
the money and a blessing.

"I'm going quick, Molly, with that laugh between us," Ruth said as she
rose and took me into her arms again for just half a second, and before
I could stop her she was gone.

She met Billy toiling up the front step with a long piece of rusty iron
gas-pipe, which took off an inch of paint as it bumped against the
doorway. She bent down and kissed the back of his neck, which theft was
almost more than I could stand and apparently more than Billy was
prepared to accept.

"Go away, girl," he said in his rudest manner; "don't you see I'm busy?"

I met him in the front hall just in time to prevent a hopeless scar on
my parquet floor. He was hot, perspiring and panting, but full of
triumph.

"I found it, Molly, I found it!" he exclaimed as he let the heavy pipe
drop almost on the bare pink toes. "You can git a hammer and pound the
end sharp and bend it so no whale