ight path, make
him sure. When the last parting comes, if he is leaving you, give him
the certainty to take with him into his narrow house, and make his last
sleep sweet. And if you are the one to go first, and leave him, old and
desolate and stricken, oh, Barbara, make him sure then--make him very
sure."

[Sidenote: A String of Pearls]

The girl's hand closed tightly upon his. He leaned over to pat her cheek
and stroke the heavy braids of silken hair. Then he felt the strand of
beads around her neck.

"You have on your mother's pearls," he said. His fine old face illumined
as he touched the tawdry trinket.

Barbara swallowed the hard lump in her throat. "Yes, Daddy." They had
lived for years upon that single strand of large, perfectly matched
pearls which Ambrose North had clasped around his young wife's neck upon
their wedding day.

"Would you like more pearls, dear? A bracelet, or a ring?"

"No--these are all I want."

"I want to give you a diamond ring some day, Barbara. Your mother's was
buried with her. It was her engagement ring."

"Perhaps somebody will give me an engagement ring," she suggested.

"I shouldn't wonder. I don't want to be selfish, dear. You are all I have,
but, if you loved a man, I wouldn't try to keep you away from him."

"Prince Charming hasn't come yet, Daddy, so cheer up. I'll tell you when
he does."

Thus she turned the talk into a happier vein. They were laughing
together like two children when Miriam came in to say that supper was
ready.

[Sidenote: Alone]

Afterward, he sat at the piano, improvising low, sweet chords that
echoed back plaintively from the dingy walls. The music was full of
questioning, of pleading, of longing so deep that it was almost prayer.
Barbara finished her letters by the light of the lamp, while Miriam sat
in the dining-room alone, asking herself the old, torturing questions,
facing her temptation, and bearing the old, terrible hunger of the heart
that hurt her like physical pain.

A little before nine o'clock, the blind man came to kiss Barbara
good-night. Then he went upstairs. Miriam came in and talked a few
minutes of quilts, pickles, and lingerie, then she, too, went up to
begin her usual restless night.

Left alone, Barbara discovered that she did not care to read. It was too
late to begin work upon the new stock of linen, lawn, and batiste which
had come the day before, and she lacked the impulse, in the face of such
discouraging prospec