up so beautifully, and then they stopped,
looked in each other's eyes and kissed each other.

"It is all just as I like it, Frank," said she, "plain and suitable,
but nothing sham, no imitations. I hate pretence--everything ought to
be genuine, as real and true as my love and your heart, you dear, good
fellow.--Now everything is perfect in the house," she continued,
picking up a thread from the carpet. "No one would recognize it; it is
the most charming little house for miles around. And it did not cost
nearly as much as Jenny's trousseau and wedding-journey."

They were standing in the open hall door, and the young man looked with
brightening eyes across the garden to the outbuildings which had
exchanged their leaky roofs for new shining blue slates.

"You are right, Gertrude, it is a pretty sight; we will sit here often.
And to-morrow they will begin to build the new barns. They must be
ready when we harvest the first rye."

"Frank," she asked, mischievously, "do you still think as you did a
week after our wedding when we spoke about this for the first time, and
you were really childish and absolutely _would_ not take anything of
that which is yours by every right human and divine? And you would have
let the cows be rained on in their stalls and the farm-servants in
their beds."

"No, Gertrude, not now," he replied.

"And why, you Iron-will?"

"Because we love each other, love each other unspeakably."

"The adjective is not necessary," corrected she.

"Don't you believe that one may love unspeakably?" asked he with a
smile.

"It sounds like a figure of speech."

He laughed aloud, and drew her out on the veranda.

"Our home," he said; "come, let us go through the garden and a little
way into the wood."

The next day Gertrude opened the windows of the guest-chamber, and made
everything there bright and fresh. The table in the dining-room was
gayly decked, and Frank drove to the city in the new carriage to bring
the judge from the station.

Gertrude was glad of the opportunity of seeing him, Frank had told her
so much about his old friend. She had laughed heartily over his
droll descriptions of his friend's peculiarities, how in company when
he tried to pay a compliment he invariably managed to make it a
back-handed one, to his own infinite astonishment.

She would take especial pains with her dress for this "jewel" of a man,
as Frank called him. She put a rosette of lace in her hair, Frank liked
that