were two sofas running the length of the compartment, and on one
of these was lying a most kind and refined-looking woman, with gray
hair and the sweetest eyes. Poor Aunt Catherine somehow felt comforted
at once; and when this new friend looked up wonderingly, and her niece
tried to keep from even smiling while she told the story discreetly,
she began to laugh at herself heartily.

"I know you want to laugh, dear," said she. "It's ridiculous, only I'm
so afraid they'll be worried about me at home. If anybody had only
seen me as I rode off, and could tell them!"

Miss Ashton had not laughed so much in a long time, the fun of the
thing outweighed the misery, and they were all very merry for a few
minutes. There was something straightforward and homelike and pleasant
in Miss Catherine's face, and the other travellers liked her at once,
as she did them. They were going to a town nearer the mountains for
the summer. Miss Ashton was just getting over a severe illness; and
they asked about the place to which they were bound, but Miss Spring
could tell them little about it.

"The country is beautiful around here, isn't it?" said Alice West,
when there was a pause: the shadows were growing long, and the sun was
almost ready to go down among the hills. "Brookton! didn't you notice
an advertisement of some one who wanted boarders there, aunty? You
thought it was hardly near enough to the mountains, didn't you? but
this is beautiful."

"Why, that was my notice," said Miss Spring; and then she stopped, and
flushed a little. I believe, if she had thought a moment, she would
not have spoken; but Miss Ashton saw the hesitation and the flush.

"I wish I were going to spend the summer with you," said she by and
by, in her frank, pleasant way. And Miss Catherine said, "I wish you
were," and sighed quietly; she felt wonderfully at home with these
strangers, and, in spite of her annoyance when she thought of her
guests, she was enjoying herself. "I live all alone," she said once,
in speaking of something else; and, if she had been alone with Miss
Ashton, I think she would have told her something of her troubles, of
which we know her heart was very full. Everybody found it easy to talk
to Miss Ashton, but there was the niece; and Miss Catherine, like most
elderly women of strong character who live alone, was used to keeping
her affairs to herself, and felt a certain pride in being
uncommunicative.

When the conductor looked in, with s