her honey."

"I don't want any of her honey. I don't see what folks want to send
things in to me, as if I were sick, for."

"Oh, I guess she thought I'd like some too," returned her mother,
with a kind of stiff playfulness. "You needn't think you're goin' to
have all that honey."

"I don't want any of it," said Lois. The window beside which she sat
was open; under it, in the back yard, was a little thicket of mint,
and some long sprays of sweetbrier bowing over it. Lois reached out
and broke off a piece of the sweetbrier and smelled it.

"Supper's ready," said her mother, presently; and she took off her
hat and went listlessly over to the table.

The table, covered with a white cloth, was set back against the wall,
with only one leaf spread. There were bread and butter and custards
and a small glass dish of rhubarb sauce for supper.

Lois looked at the dish. "I didn't know the rhubarb was grown," said
she.

"I managed to get enough for supper," replied her mother, in a casual
voice.

Nobody would have dreamed how day after day she had journeyed stiffly
down to the old garden spot behind the house to watch the progress of
the rhubarb, and how triumphantly she had brought up those green and
rosy stalks. Lois had always been very fond of rhubarb.

She ate it now with a keen relish. Her mother contrived that she
should have nearly all of it; she made a show of helping herself
twice, but she took very little. But it was to her as if she also
tasted every spoonful which her daughter ate, and as if it had the
flavor of a fruit of Paradise and satisfied her very soul.

After supper Lois began packing up the cups and saucers.

"Now you go in the other room an' set down, an' let me take care of
the dishes," said Mrs. Field, timidly.

Lois faced about instantly. "Now, mother, I'd just like to know what
you mean?" said she. "I guess I ain't quite so far gone but what I
can wash up a few dishes. You act as if you wanted to make me out
sick in spite of myself."

"I thought mebbe you was kind of tired," said her mother,
apologetically.

"I ain't tired. I'm jest as well able to wash up the supper dishes as
I ever was." Lois carried the cups and saucers to the sink with a
resolute air, and Mrs. Field said no more. She went into her bedroom
to change her dress; she was going to evening meeting.

Lois washed and put away the dishes; then she went into the
sitting-room, and sat down by the open window. She leaned her