airs; and if papa will consent, we'll collect
his bills, and then later, I've another scheme--that is a fine,
sweet-toned piano in the parlor. I mean to give lessons."

"Grace, it was an extravagance in our circumstances to get that piano,
but the girls were so tired of the old one; it was worn out, a tin pan,
and this is to be paid for on easy terms, so much a month."

Grace hated to have her mother to apologize in this way. She hastened to
say, "I'm glad it's here, and don't think me conceited, but I've had the
best instruction uncle could secure for me here, and a short course in
Berlin, and now I mean to make it of some use. I believe I can get
pupils."

"Not many in Highland, I fear, Grace."

"If not in Highland, in New York. Leave that to me."

Mrs. Wainwright felt as if she had been taking a tonic. To the lady
living her days out in her own chamber, and unaccustomed to excitement,
there was something very surprising and very stimulating too in the
swift way of settling things and the fearlessness of this young girl.
Though she had yielded very reluctantly to her brother's wish to keep
Grace apart from her family and wholly his own for so many years, she
now saw there was good in it. Her little girl had developed into a
resolute, capable and strong sort of young woman, who could make use of
whatever tools her education had put into her hands.

"This hasn't been quite the right kind of Sunday talk, mother," said
Grace, "but I haven't been here three days without seeing there's a
cloud, and I don't like to give up to clouds. I'm like the old woman who
must take her broom and sweep the cobwebs out of the sky."

"God helping you, my dear, you will succeed. You have swept some cobwebs
out of my sky already."

"God helping me, yes, dear. Thank you for saying that. Now don't you
want me to sing to you? I'll darken your room and set the door ajar, and
then I'll go to the parlor and play soft, rippling, silvery things, and
sing to you, and you will fall asleep while I'm singing, and have a
lovely nap before they all come home."

As Grace went down the stairs, she paused a moment at the door of the
big dining-room, "large as a town hall," her father sometimes said.
Everything at Wishing-Brae was of ample size--great rooms, lofty
ceilings, big fire-places, broad windows.

"I missed the sideboard, the splendid old mahogany piece with its deep
winy lustre, and the curious carved work. Mother must have grieved to
pa