s as completely as
if they had never known any others, and it seemed to Dab, now and then,
as if they had taken almost too complete possession. His mother had her
room, as a matter of course, and a big one. There could be no objection
to that. Then another big one, of the very best, had to be set apart and
fitted up for Ham and Miranda on their return, and Dab delighted in
doing all in his power to make that room all it could be made. But,
then, Samantha had insisted on a separate domain, and Keziah and Pamela
imitated their elder sister to a fraction. The "guest-chamber" had to be
provided as well, or what would become of the good old Long Island
customs of hospitality?

[Illustration: THE FIRE (SEE PAGE 748.)]

Dab said nothing for a while, but one day, at dinner, just after the
arrival of a letter from Miranda announcing the speedy return of herself
and husband, he quietly remarked:

"Now I can't sleep in Ham's room any longer,--I suppose I'll have to go
out on the roof. I wont sleep in the garret or in the cellar."

"That'll be a good deal as Mrs. Morris says, when she comes," calmly
responded his mother.

"As Miranda says!" said Dab, with a long breath.

"Miranda?" gasped Samantha and her sisters.

"Yes, my dears, certainly," said their mother. "This is Mrs. Morris's
house, or her husband's,--not mine. All the arrangements I have made are
only temporary. She and Ham both have ideas and wills of their own. I've
only done the best I could for the time being."

The girls looked at one another in blank amazement over the idea of Mrs.
Kinzer being anything less than the mistress of any house she might
happen to be in, but Dabney laid down his knife and fork with:

"It's all right, then. If Ham and Miranda are to settle it, I think I'll
take the room Sam has now. You needn't take away your books, Sam. I may
want to read some of them or lend them to Annie. You and Kezi and Meli
had better take that upper room back. The smell of the paint's all gone
now, and there's three kinds of carpet on the floor."

"Dabney!" exclaimed Samantha, reproachfully, and with an appealing look
at her mother, who, however, said nothing on either side, and was a
woman of too much good sense to take any other view of the matter than
that she had announced.

Things were all running on smoothly and pleasantly before dinner was
over, but Dab's ideas of the way the house should be divided were likely
to result in some changes. Perhaps n