his next market day, she would ask his
permission.

All the way home Steven wondered nervously what the old people would
say to him. He dreaded to see the familiar gate, and the ride came to
an end so very soon. To his great relief he found that they had
scarcely noticed his absence. Their only son and his family had come
unexpectedly from the next State to stay over Thanksgiving, and
everything else had been forgotten in their great surprise.

The days that followed were full of pleasant anticipations for the
family. Steven went in and out among them, helping busily with the
preparations, but strangely silent among all the merriment.

Mr. Dearborn took his son to town with him the next market day, and
Steven was left at home to wait and wonder what message Mrs. Estel
might send him.

He hung around until after his usual bedtime, on their return, but
could not muster up courage to ask. The hope that had sprung up
within him flickered a little fainter each new day, until it almost
died out.

It was a happy group that gathered around the breakfast table early on
Thanksgiving morning.

"All here but Rindy," said Mr. Dearborn, looking with smiling eyes
from his wife to his youngest grandchild. "It's too bad she couldn't
come, but Arad invited all his folks to spend the day there; so she
had to give up and stay at home. Well, we're all alive and well,
anyhow. That's my greatest cause for thankfulness. What's yours,
Jane?" he asked, nodding towards his wife.

As the question passed around the table, Steven's thoughts went back
to the year before, when their little family had all been together. He
remembered how pretty his mother had looked that morning in her
dark-blue dress. There was a bowl of yellow chrysanthemums blooming on
the table, and a streak of sunshine, falling across them and on
Robin's hair, seemed to turn them both to gold. Now he was all alone.
The contrast was too painful. He slipped from the table unobserved,
and stole noiselessly up the back stairs to his room. The little
checked apron was hanging on a chair by the window. He sat down and
laid his face against it, but his eyes were dry. He had not cried any
since that first dreadful night.

There was such a lively clatter of dishes downstairs and babel of
voices that he did not hear a sleigh drive up in the soft snow.

"Steven," called Mr. Dearborn from the foot of the stairs, "I promised
Mrs. Estel to let you spend the day with her, but there w