ary toiled cheerfully. She swept, dusted,
scrubbed, cooked, did errands, mailed the letter which made certain
another bolt of brown alpaca, built fires, and, in the afternoon,
brought down the heavy roll of unbleached muslin from the attic. Aunt
Matilda cleared off the dining-room table, got out the worn newspaper
patterns, and had sent Rosemary out for a paper of pins before she
remembered that it was Friday, and that no new task begun on a Friday
could ever be a success.

So, while Rosemary set the table for supper, the other two harked back
to the fateful day when Frank Starr brought his wife home. They were in
the next room, but their shrill voices carried well and Rosemary heard
every word, though she earnestly wished that she need not.

[Sidenote: A Lucky Friday]

"It was Friday, too, if you'll remember, when Frank brought her," said
Aunt Matilda, indicating Rosemary by an inclination of her untidy head.

"Then you can't say Friday's always unlucky," commented Grandmother. "It
may have been bad for us but it was good for her. Supposin' that
butterfly had had her to bring up--what'd she have been by now?"

"She resembles her ma some," answered Matilda, irrelevantly; "at least
she would if she was pretty. She's got the same look about her,
somehow."

"I never thought her ma was pretty. It was always a mystery to me what
Frank saw in her."

"Come to supper," called Rosemary, abruptly. She was unable to bear
more.

The meal was unexpectedly enlivened by Grandmother's discovery of a
well-soaked milk ticket in the pitcher. From the weekly issue of _The
Household Guardian_, which had reached her that day, she had absorbed a
vast amount of knowledge pertaining to the manners and customs of germs,
and began to fear for her life. At first, it was thought to be
Rosemary's fault, but upon recalling that for many years the ticket had
always been left in the pitcher, the blame was shifted to the hapless
milkman.

[Sidenote: At the Close of the Day]

Some discussion ensued as to what should be said to the milkman and who
should say it, but Rosemary observed, with more or less reason, that if
his attention was called to the error, he might want another ticket. At
length it was decided to say nothing, and Grandmother personally assumed
charge of the ticket, putting it to dry between newspapers in the hope
of using it again.

After supper, Rosemary washed the dishes, set the table for breakfast,
and sat quietly, with