t. "What in the world are you
talking about, Jean Macdougall?" she exclaimed, in wrath. "On the town!
Are you clean daft? On the town, indeed! Clear out of my house this
moment, you lying, evil-speaking woman!"

The second Miss Macdougall rose in majesty, and drew her black silk
visite round her. "Of whom ye are speaking, Miss Hinsdale, I knaw not,"
she said, growing Scotch in her anger; "but I believe ye hae lost your
wits. I tak' my departure freely, and not as sent by one who has
strangely forgotten the demeanor of a leddy."

With hands folded, she swept toward the door, all the flowers on her
dignified bonnet swaying perceptibly. Pausing on the threshold, she
added, "As a gude Christian, and a keeper of my word, I still say, Miss
Hinsdale, in spite of insults, that in the matter of a fish or two, or a
barrel of potatoes now and then, ye can count upon the Macdougalls."

Left alone, Miss Lois put on her shawl and bonnet with feverish haste,
and went over to the Agency. Anne was in the sitting-room, and the
children were with her.

"Anne, of course you and the children are coming to live with me
whenever you think it best to leave this house," said Miss Lois,
appearing on the threshold like an excited ghost in spectacles. "You
never thought or planned anything else, I hope?"

"No," said Anne, frankly, "I did not--at least for the present. I knew
you would help us, Miss Lois, although you did not speak."

"Speak! was there any need of speaking?" said the elder woman, bursting
into a few dry, harsh sobs. "You are all I have in the world, Anne. How
could you mistrust me?"

"I did not," said Anne.

And then the two women kissed each other, and it was all understood
without further words. And thus, through the intervention of the second
Miss Macdougall (who found herself ill rewarded for her pains), Lois
Hinsdale came out from the watch-chamber of her dead to real life again,
took up her burden, and went on.

Anne now unfolded her plans, for she had been obliged to invent plans:
necessity forced her forward. "We must all come to you for a time, dear
Miss Lois; but I am young and strong, and I can work. I wish to educate
the boys as father would have wished them educated. Do you ask what I
can do? I think--that is, I hope--that I can teach." Then, in a lower
voice, she added, "I promised father that I would do all I could for the
children, and I shall keep my promise."

Miss Lois's eyes filled with tears. But th