h things to do
for people, I'm finding out. But, have you promised?"

"Yes, I have promised."

"And I know you keep your promises. I'm sure you won't forget. Poor
mother isn't happy; she's troubled."

"About you?"

"No, about herself, because she isn't a Christian."

"That's enough to trouble anybody," said Marjorie, wisely.

"Now, one more promise in payment. Will you write to me every two weeks?"

"Oh, I couldn't," pleaded Marjorie.

"Now you've found something too hard to do for me," he said,
reproachfully.

"Oh, I'll do it, of course; but I'm afraid."

"You'll soon get over that. You see mother doesn't write often, and
father never does, and I'm often anxious about them, and if you write and
tell me about them twice a month I shall be happier. You see you are
doing something for me."

"Yes, thank you. I'll do the best I can. But I can't write like your
cousin Helen," she added, jealously.

"No matter. You'll do; and you will be growing older and constantly
improving and I shall begin to travel for the house by and by and my
letters will be as entertaining as a book of travels."

"Will you write to me? I didn't think of that."

"Goosie!" he laughed, giving her Linnet's pet name. "Certainly I will
write as often as you do, and you mustn't stop writing until your last
letter has not been answered for a month."

"I'll remember," said Marjorie, seriously. "But I wish I could do
something else. Did you have to pay money for it?"

Marjorie was accustomed to "bartering" and that is the reason that she
used the expression "pay money."

"Well, yes, something," he replied, pressing his lips together.

He was angry with the shoemaker about that bargain yet.

"How much? I want to pay you."

"Ladies never ask a gentleman such a question when they make them a
present," he said, laughing as he arose. "Imagine Helen asking me how
much I paid for the set of books I gave her on her birthday."

The tears sprang to Marjorie's eyes. Had she done a dreadful thing that
Helen would not think of doing?

Long afterward she learned that he gave for the plate the ten dollars
that his father gave him for a "vacation present."

"Good-bye, Goosie, keep both promises and don't run up a ladder again
until you learn how to run down."

But she could not speak yet for the choking in her throat.

"You have paid me twice over with those promises," he said. "I am glad
you broke the old yellow pitcher."

So was she even wh