as when
he had a bit put by!" Mary sighed, and flicked away a tear. "And now
you're going next! I'm getting a bit sick of bad luck, I am!"

Cornelia was bending forward in her seat, her chin supported in the
palms of her hands. Her expression was very grave and wistful, but in
her eyes shone the light of awakened interest.

"Mury!--you've been real good and attentive to me. I guess I've given
you quite a heap of trouble. I want to make you a present before I go.
Would you like it if I fixed-up that house so's you could get married
right away? If you say so, you can go to that store and make your own
bargains, and I'll leave thirty pounds with Miss Ramsden to pay the
bills. I'd like to feel I'd helped you to a home of your own, Mury!"

Mary clutched the back of a chair near to which she was standing; her
eyes protruded, her chin dropped, speech failed her in the excess of
emotion. She could only stare, and gasp, and stare again.

"Poor Mury!" said Cornelia, softly. "Are you so pleased? I want you
should be pleased. If I ken make someone happy to-day--right-down,
tearing happy, it's going to help me more'n you know. ... Won't you
enjoy going shopping with your friend, Mury, bossing round in that
store, choosing the things you want, and putting on airs as if you owned
the bank? Mind you put on airs, Mury! Make 'em hop round, and get
things to your taste. They'll think the more of you, and it's not every
day one furnishes a house. ... I'll send you my picture to stand on the
mantelpiece in that parlour, and when you dust it in the mornings, you
can send me a kind thought 'way over all those miles of ocean, and I'll
think of you sitting in the lady's chair. ... For the land's sake,
girl, don't have a fit! You don't need to have a thing unless you say
so!"

"Oh, Miss Cornelia!" sobbed Mary, brokenly. "You're too--I'm so--you're
an _angel_, Miss Cornelia, that's what you are! ... Jim will go off his
head when he hears this.--It's a sort of thing you can't seem to
believe.--I loved to wait on you, miss; if you'd never given me a thing
I'd have loved it all the same--you talked so kind, and took such an
interest, and was always so lively and laughing. It wasn't for what I
could get--but the house! ... To have a house thrown at you, as you may
say, at a moment's notice--it--takes away my breath! I can't seem to
take it in."

"But you are happy, Mury? You feel happy to think of it?"

"I should thin