mon sense and love for you, to come to me, FIRST,
when you feel that there's a girl who is indispensable to your future,
Adam?"

"Yes, I will," said Adam. "And it won't be long, and the girl will be
Milly York."

"All right," said Kate, gravely, "whenever the time comes, let me know
about it. Now see if you can find me something to eat till I lay off
my hat and wash. It was a long, hot ride, and I'm tired. Since there's
nothing I can do, I wish I had stayed where I was. No, I don't, either!
I see joy coming over the hill for Nancy Ellen."

"Why is joy coming to Nancy Ellen?" asked the boy, pausing an instant
before he started to the kitchen.

"Oh, because she's had such a very tough, uncomfortable time with
life," said Kate, "that in the very nature of things joy SHOULD come
her way."

The boy stood mystified until the expression on his face so amused Kate
that she began laughing, then he understood.

"That's WHY it's coming," said Kate; "and, here's HOW it's coming. She
is going to get rid of a bothersome worry that's troubling her
head--and she's going to have a very splendid gift, but it's a deep
secret."

"Then you'll have to whisper it," said Adam, going to her and holding a
convenient ear. Kate rested her hands on his shoulder a minute, as she
leaned on him, her face buried in his crisp black hair. Then she
whispered the secret.

"Crickey, isn't that grand!" cried the boy, backing away to stare at
her.

"Yes, it is so grand I'm going to try it ourselves," said Kate. "We've
a pretty snug balance in the bank, and I think it would be great fun
evenings or when we want to go to town in a hurry and the horses are
tired."

Adam was slowly moving toward the kitchen, his face more of a study
than before.

"Mother," he said as he reached the door, "I be hanged if I know how to
take you! I thought you'd just raise Cain over what Polly has done;
but you act so sane and sensible; someway it doesn't seem so bad as it
did, and I feel more sorry for Polly than like going back on her. And
are you truly in earnest about a car?"

"I'm going to think very seriously about it this winter, and I feel
almost sure it will come true by early spring," said Kate. "But who
said anything about 'going back on Polly?'"

"Oh, Mrs. York and all the neighbours said that you'd never forgive
her, and that she'd never darken your door again, and things like that
until I was almost crazy," answered Adam.

Kate smiled grimly