in it. "Well, I shall be."

"You'll never be anything but lovely--when you're an old lady you'll be
stately and distinguished, and your eyes will shine like stars, and men
will still fall in love with you----"

"Oh, Sophie, you're such a comfort----"

* * * * *

The next morning Delia sent up three breakfasts on trays.

"If it wasn't for that pretty child," she said to little Jane Trefry,
who helped her in the kitchen, "there wouldn't be any satisfaction in
getting things ready. Miss Sophie has learned foreign ways and wants
rolls and coffee, and Miss Diana wants grape fruit. I don't know what's
the matter with her appetite; she hasn't eaten enough for a bird since
she came, and yet that first night she said to me, 'Oh, Delia, I'm just
dying for some of your good New England cooking!'"

"Maybe she's in love," said little Jane, who was romantic.

Delia turned her omelette deftly. "Of course she is. Everybody knows she
just about worships Dr. Blake, only she won't marry him till she gets
good and ready. That's the house he's building for her--up the road,
with the red-tiled roof and the wide stone porches. He had the window of
her room toward Minot's, so that the light could say, 'I love you' to
her at night."

"She'd better look out," stated little Jane, with provincial frankness;
"if she waits too long he'll be finding some one else to say 'I love
you' to."

"You keep your mind on that toast," Delia was dishing up the omelette,
"and don't you forget that Miss Diana isn't the kind that a man goes
back on. She could have had a dozen richer men than the doctor. But she
didn't want them, and maybe she doesn't want him, but don't you get it
into your head that he wants anybody else."

Little Jane sniffed. "You can't tell about men," she said, as she went
out of the door with Bettina's tray.

Bettina, sitting up in bed, welcomed little Jane with enthusiasm. She
ate everything from strawberries to omelette with a hearty appetite,
then she lay comfortably, looking out toward the eastern horizon where
the smoky streak of a steamer showed faintly.

Presently Sophie came in with a gown of white serge--of simple lines,
with wide collar and cuffs of sheer embroidered muslin. "Diana insisted
that I should get some white things in Paris," she said, as she laid it
over a chair. "She hoped that I might be induced to dress in something
besides black, but I can't, and so I am sure that you wil