en I go
into the room, but I'd lay down my life fur to ease her," said Daddy
the tears coming to his eyes. "Tween you and me, it ain't no common
trouble workin' on the pet," he said, coming close to the two and
speaking low, "I've knowed her sence she was a baby, I've seen all of
her putty ways, and none of her bad ways, fur she never had none; she
hes growd up perfect and she allers treated the doctor dutiful, and
she's got nothin' to reproach herself fur. I'm afered," and he sank
his voice to a whisper, "the Honey has got a separate trouble."

"What that trouble was Daddy did not define for he was interrupted by
a knock at the door, which he opened and ushered in the Sherman
family.

"Tween you and me, the Honey ain't spoke nor slept, nor eat," said
Daddy, in answer to Mrs. Sherman's enquiry after Little Wolf, "but
maybe it will ease her a leetle to know that you are here," he said,
looking sideways at Edward.

Daddy fidgeted around Little Wolf for several moments, before he could
muster courage to break the silence, and tell her who were waiting
below, and he almost regretted having done so, when he saw the look of
agony, which the information brought to her face.

"Daddy," said she in a choking voice, "ask Mrs. Sherman to my room,
the others will excuse me to-day."

It was some alleviation to Edward's disappointment, as he rode home
with Louise, to know that his mother was to be Little Wolf's companion
and consoler until the arrival of her old friends, the Tinknors, who
had been sent for, to be present at the funeral.

During the few days they were together, Mrs. Sherman strove by every
means she could devise to give her young friend some relief from the
distress of mind, under which it was evident she was laboring. But she
was at length obliged to return home, leaving to Mrs. Tinknor's skill
the trying case, which had baffled her own benevolent efforts.

It was the day on which her father's remains had been consigned to
their last resting place in a secluded part of his grounds, beside the
grave of her mother, that Little Wolf sat alone by her upper window
looking sadly out towards the burial spot, which she had left only a
few hours previously.

The Squire and Mrs. Tinknor were in the parlor below, engaged in
conversation concerning the events of the past few days, and Tom
Tinknor, to whom the solemnities of the occasion had been extremely
irksome, was wandering aimlessly about the house with hands in hi