n would have been figuratively torn to pieces if she had spent
Sunday at the Center. Uncle Jason's first resolve was that he would wait
until Sunday afternoon before announcing the conspiracy. The more he
thought of the plan the greater the benefit to Helen seemed. She _was_
different from the Mulfords, and she had no Cummings blood in her veins.
She had changed these few weeks of her sojourn with Mrs. Dayton. Not
that she had grown consequential. Indeed, she had never been more simply
sweet than on this afternoon.

She would hate the shop dreadfully. And after all the three dollars a
week she would earn the first year, would not more than pay for her
board and clothes. Jenny had gone at it with a vim. But she hated books.
The only thing that interested her was arithmetic. Uncle Jason could not
put it in words, but he could feel it.

The supper passed off without any squabbles. Sam and Jenny walked down
to the house, the children were tired and went to bed, and Aunt Jane
came out on the porch to take a turn in her rocking chair and fan
herself cool. But the wind blew up, and she did not even have to fan.

"Did you ask whether Helen would come home next week? Polly Samson comes
two days to make Jen's wedding gown, and she'll be married on the
sixteenth. We've got along wonderfully the last fortnight, and I begin
to see my way clear. Dear, how I shall miss Jen, but I'm glad she'll be
so near by. And she bid 'em good-by at the shop to-day. Reely's getting
to be quite a help. I don't know but it _was_ better for her to have
Helen away in vacation."

Uncle Jason felt this was the golden opportunity. The lovers would not
be home until about ten. It took some courage. He cleared his throat,
listened a moment to the crickets, and then plunged into the subject;
blurting it all out before Aunt Jane could recover her breath. In fact
there was such an awful silence he wondered.

Then the storm descended. He smoked his pipe and listened, though he
heard the crickets with one ear, he would have said. And when he did not
make an immediate answer, she said angrily:

"You never consented to any such tomfoolery!"

"In the first place," he began slowly, "we couldn't keep Helen against
her will. Her father didn't make us guardians. At fourteen she can
choose. She isn't bound to us, and we haven't any real claim on her----"

"Except common gratitude," Aunt Jane flung out.

"We've taken care of her a few years. I dare say there'd be