I'm taking this bouquet of geraniums to put on Grandpa Irving's
grave for grandma. And look, teacher, I'm going to put this bunch of
white roses beside Grandpa's grave in memory of my little mother. . .
because I can't go to her grave to put it there. But don't you think
she'll know all about it, just the same?"

"Yes, I am sure she will, Paul."

"You see, teacher, it's just three years today since my little mother
died. It's such a long, long time but it hurts just as much as ever
. . . and I miss her just as much as ever. Sometimes it seems to me
that I just can't bear it, it hurts so."

Paul's voice quivered and his lip trembled. He looked down at his roses,
hoping that his teacher would not notice the tears in his eyes.

"And yet," said Anne, very softly, "you wouldn't want it to stop hurting
. . . you wouldn't want to forget your little mother even if you could."

"No, indeed, I wouldn't . . . that's just the way I feel. You're so good
at understanding, teacher. Nobody else understands so well . . . not even
grandma, although she's so good to me. Father understood pretty well,
but still I couldn't talk much to him about mother, because it made him
feel so bad. When he put his hand over his face I always knew it was
time to stop. Poor father, he must be dreadfully lonesome without
me; but you see he has nobody but a housekeeper now and he thinks
housekeepers are no good to bring up little boys, especially when he has
to be away from home so much on business. Grandmothers are better, next
to mothers. Someday, when I'm brought up, I'll go back to father and
we're never going to be parted again."

Paul had talked so much to Anne about his mother and father that she
felt as if she had known them. She thought his mother must have been
very like what he was himself, in temperament and disposition; and she
had an idea that Stephen Irving was a rather reserved man with a deep
and tender nature which he kept hidden scrupulously from the world.

"Father's not very easy to get acquainted with," Paul had said once. "I
never got really acquainted with him until after my little mother died.
But he's splendid when you do get to know him. I love him the best in
all the world, and Grandma Irving next, and then you, teacher. I'd love
you next to father if it wasn't my DUTY to love Grandma Irving best,
because she's doing so much for me. YOU know, teacher. I wish she would
leave the lamp in my room till I go to sleep, though. S