whispered Lemuel anxiously, as he peered into the
bright peaceful face on his way to bed.

The hand that stroked his tumbled hair was very gentle.

'No, Lemuel, only sorry that my boy forgot the King was looking on.'

With a shame-faced look the boy's hand sought his pocket, but Satan
whispered, 'She may be mad to-morrow,' and he crept away.

'What are you teasing Pauline about?' asked Stephen, as he went
upstairs.

'Ain't doin' nuthin',' was the sullen reply.

'Yes, you are. She don't hev sorrowful looks in her eyes unless you're
cuttin' up worse than common. You've just got to leave off sudden, or
I'll give you something you won't ever forgit.'

'Ain't goin' ter be bossed by nobody,' said the boy doggedly, as he
reached his room. 'Was goin' ter give her the old letter to-morrow,
anyway, but now I don't care if she never gits it,' and opening the
chest which held his few treasures, he deliberately shut up the letter
in an old tin box, and went to bed.

* * * * *

'Father is gettin' so mortal queer,' said Stephen discontentedly. 'First
he tells me to top-dress the upper lot, and then right off he wants me
to harness up and go to the mill. I don't see how a feller's to know
what to do. Most wish I'd gone West with Leander, it's a free life
there, and he's his own master.'

'"One is our Master, even Christ,"' Pauline quoted softly. 'Don't go,
Stephen, you and Lemuel are the only ones on the farm now, and father is
getting old.'

She spoke sadly. She had noticed with a sinking heart how 'queer' her
father was.

The years had slipped by until Polly was seventeen. A very frail little
body she was, but always so patient and sweet, that Pauline never
grudged the constant care.

Two of the boys had taken the shaping of their own lives and gone away,
and Susan Ann had a home of her own with two little freckled-faced
children to call her mother.

'We'll jog along together, Stephen,' she said in her bright, cheery way.
'Father forgets now and then, but he doesn't mean any harm, and it's
only one day at a time, you know.'

Stephen looked at her admiringly.

'You're a brick, Pawliney, and I guess if you can stand it, I ought to
be able to, with you round making the sunshine. I'd be a brute to go
and leave you and Lem with it all on your shoulders'; and the honest,
good-hearted fellow went in to give Polly a kiss before he started for
the mill.

Clearing out an old trunk next day