r'll be on the
table."

The door banged and she was gone. But as she moved alone about the kitchen
she was still haunted by the clear, questioning eyes of the child in the
photograph upstairs. They seemed to follow her accusingly, reproachfully.

"Drat old pictures!" she at last burst out angrily. "They'd ought to be
burnt up--the whole lot of them! They always set you thinkin'."

CHAPTER IV

THE EPISODE OF THE EGGS

The next morning while Ellen stood at the kitchen table slicing bread for
breakfast, Lucy, her figure girlish in a blue and white pinafore, appeared
in the doorway.

"Good morning, Aunt Ellen," she said. "You will have to forgive me this
once for being late. Everything was so still I didn't wake up. Your nice
feather bed was too comfortable, I'm afraid. But it shan't happen again.
After this I mean to be prompt as the sun, for I'm going to be the one to
get the breakfast. You must promise to let me do it. I'd love to. I am
quite accustomed to getting up early, and after serving breakfast for
twelve, breakfast for two looks like nothing at all." As she spoke she
moved with buoyant step across the room to the table.

"Shan't I toast the bread?" she inquired.

"I ain't a-goin' to toast it," returned Ellen in a curt tone. "Hot bread
an' melted butter's bad for folks, 'specially in the mornin'."

Lucy smiled. "It never hurts me," she replied.

"Nor me," put in her aunt quickly. "I don't give it a chance to. But
whether or no, I don't have it. When you melt butter all up, you use twice
as much, an' there ain't no use wastin' food."

"I never thought about the butter."

"Them as has the least in the world is the ones that generally toss the
most money away," the elder woman observed.

The transient kindliness of the night before had vanished, giving place to
her customary sharpness of tone. Lucy paid no heed to the innuendo.

"I might make an omelet while I'm waiting," she suggested pleasantly. "Dad
used to think I made quite a nice one."

"I don't have eggs in the mornin', either," replied Ellen.

"Don't you like eggs?"

"I don't eat 'em."

"How funny! I always have an egg for breakfast."

"You won't here," came crisply from her aunt.

Lucy failed to catch the gist of the remark.

"Why, I thought you kept hens," she said innocently.

"I do."

"Oh, I see. They're not laying."

"Yes, they are. I get about four dozen eggs every day," retorted Ellen.
"But I sell 'em instead of e