ing her arms round the old woman's
neck, cry out to her that everything was settled. And instead she
must come to the point gently, prudently, wisely, "like other people"
as she said to herself.

The cottage seemed very still that afternoon, and Robinette knocked
twice before she heard the piping old voice cry out to her to come
in.

"Why, Nurse dear, where are you? Were you asleep?" Robinette said as
she entered, for Mrs. Prettyman was not sitting in the fine new chair.
Then she found that the voice answered from the little bedroom off the
kitchen, and that the old woman was in bed.

"I ain't ill, so to speak, dear, just weary in me bones," she
explained, as Robinette sat down beside her. "And Mrs. Darke, me
neighbour, she sez to me, 'You do take the day in bed, Mrs. Prettyman,
me dear, an' I'll do your bit of work for 'ee'--so 'ere I be, Missie,
right enough."

"I'm afraid you were worried yesterday," said Robinette; "worried
about leaving the house."

"I were, Missie, I were," she confessed.

"That's why I came to-day; you must stop worrying, for I've settled
all about it. I spoke to my aunt last night, and it's true that you
have to leave this house; but now I've come to make arrangements with
you about a new one."

The old woman covered her face with her hands and gave a little cry
that went straight to Robinette's heart.

"Lor' now, Miss, 'ow am I ever to leave this place where I've been all
these years? I thought yesterday as you said 'twas a mistake I'd
made."

"But alas, it wasn't altogether a mistake," Robinette had to confess
sadly, her eyes filling with tears as she realized how she had only
doubled her old friend's disappointment. Then she sat forward and took
Mrs. Prettyman's hand in hers.

"Nursie dear," she said, "I don't want you to grieve about leaving
the old home, for it isn't an awfully good one; the new one is going
to be ever so much better!"

"That's so, I'm sure, dearie, only 'tis _new_," faltered Mrs.
Prettyman. "If you're spared to my age, Missie, you'll find as new
things scare you."

"Ah, but not a new house, Nursie! Wait till I describe it! Everything
strong and firm about it, not shaking in the storms as this one
does; nice bright windows to let in all the sunshine; so no more
'rheumatics' and no more tears of pain in your dear old eyes!"

Robinette's voice failed suddenly, for it struck her all in a moment
that her glowing description of the new home seemed to have in i