dead with her. Will you come in and see her?"

"Well, no, not just now. She wouldn't know me, and Mrs. Joel says
strangers kind of excite her--a pretty bad place the hotel would be
for her at that rate, I should think. I must go and tell Peter about
it, and I'll send up some of my black currant jam for her."

When Mrs. Stapp had gone, Mrs. March went back to her guest. Lou
Baxter had fallen asleep with her head pillowed on the soft plush back
of her chair. Mrs. March looked at the hollow, hectic cheeks and the
changed, wasted features, and her bright brown eyes softened with
tears.

"Poor Lou," she said softly, as she brushed a loose lock of grey hair
back from the sleeping woman's brow.

Nan

Nan was polishing the tumblers at the pantry window, outside of which
John Osborne was leaning among the vines. His arms were folded on the
sill and his straw hat was pushed back from his flushed, eager face as
he watched Nan's deft movements.

Beyond them, old Abe Stewart was mowing the grass in the orchard with
a scythe and casting uneasy glances at the pair. Old Abe did not
approve of John Osborne as a suitor for Nan. John was poor; and old
Abe, although he was the wealthiest farmer in Granville, was bent on
Nan's making a good match. He looked upon John Osborne as a mere
fortune-hunter, and it was a thorn in the flesh to see him talking to
Nan while he, old Abe, was too far away to hear what they were saying.
He had a good deal of confidence in Nan, she was a sensible,
level-headed girl. Still, there was no knowing what freak even a
sensible girl might take into her head, and Nan was so determined when
she did make up her mind. She was his own daughter in that.

However, old Abe need not have worried himself. It could not be said
that Nan was helping John Osborne on in his wooing at all. Instead,
she was teasing and snubbing him by turns.

Nan was very pretty. Moreover, Nan was well aware of the fact. She
knew that the way her dark hair curled around her ears and forehead
was bewitching; that her complexion was the envy of every girl in
Granville; that her long lashes had a trick of drooping over very
soft, dark eyes in a fashion calculated to turn masculine heads
hopelessly. John Osborne knew all this too, to his cost. He had called
to ask Nan to go with him to the Lone Lake picnic the next day. At
this request Nan dropped her eyes and murmured that she was sorry, but
he was too late--she had promised to g