ad hoped that city life was
now to end, and that he and his dear mistress were to travel back to their
beloved prairies. No amount of oats could ever make up to him for his
freedom, and the quiet, and the hills. He had a feeling that he should
like to go back home and die. He had seen enough of the world.

She fastened the halter to a ring in the sidewalk, which surprised him.
The grocer's boy never fastened him. He looked up questioningly at the
house, but saw no reason why his mistress should go in there. It was not
familiar ground. Koffee and Sons never came up this way.

Elizabeth, as she crossed the sidewalk and mounted the steps before the
formidable carved doors, felt that here was the last hope of finding an
earthly habitation. If this failed her, then there was the desert, and
starvation, and a long, long sleep. But while the echo of the cell still
sounded through the high-ceiled hall there came to her the words: "Let not
your heart be troubled.... In my Father's house are many mansions; if it
were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.... I
will come again and receive you." How sweet that was! Then, even if she
died on the desert, there was a home prepared for her. So much she had
learned in Christian Endeavor meeting.

The stately butler let her in. He eyed her questioningly at first, and
said madam was not up yet; but Elizabeth told him she would wait.

"Is she sick?" asked Elizabeth with a strange constriction about her
heart.

"O no, she is not up yet, miss," said the kind old butler; "she never gets
up before this. You're from Mrs. Sands, I suppose." Poor soul, for once
his butler eyes had been mistaken. He thought she was the little
errand-girl from Madam Bailey's modiste.

"No, I'm just Elizabeth," said the girl, smiling. She felt that this man,
whoever he was, was not against her. He was old, and he had a kind look.

He still thought she meant she was not the modiste, just her errand-girl.
Her quaint dress and the long braid down her back made her look like a
child.

"I'll tell her you've come. Be seated," said the butler, and gave her a
chair in the dim hall just opposite the parlor door, where she had a
glimpse of elegance such as she had never dreamed existed. She tried to
think how it must be to live in such a room and walk on velvet. The carpet
was deep and rich. She did not know it was a rug nor that it was woven in
some poor peasant's home and then was brought he