"Well," said Letty with a break in her voice, "that's love, so far as
I can see, and if you've been lucky enough to win it, take it and be
thankful, and above all, nurse and keep it.--So one of Reba's cards,
the one the publisher thought would never sell, found you and brought
you back! How wonderful! We little thought of that, Reba and I!"

"Reba's work didn't stop there, Letty! There was so much that had to
be said between you and me, just now, that I couldn't let another
subject creep in till it was finished and we were friends;--but Dick
Larrabee saw Reba's card about 'the folks back home' in Chicago and
he bought a ticket for Beulah just as I did. We met in the train and
compared notes."

"Dick Larrabee home?"

The blood started in Letty's heart and sped hither and thither,
warming her from head to foot.

"Yes, looking as fit as a fiddle; the way a man looks when things are
coming his way."

"But what did the card mean to him? Did he seem to like Reba's
verses?"

"Yes, but I guess the card just spelled home to him; and he recognized
this house in a minute, of course. I showed him my card and he said:
'That's Letty fast enough: I know the cape.' He recognized you in a
minute, he said."

He knew the cape! Yes, the old cape had been close to his shoulder
many a time. He liked it and said it matched her hair.

"He was awfully funny about your ear, too! I told him I never noticed
women's ears, and he said he did, when they were pretty, and their
eyelashes, too.--Anything remarkable about your eyelashes, Letty?"

"Nothing that I'm aware of!" said Letty laughingly, although she was
fibbing and she knew it.

"And he said he'd call and say 'Merry Christmas' to you the first
thing to-morrow; that he would have been here to-night but you'd know
his father had to come first. You don't mind being second to the
parson, do you?"

No, Letty didn't mind. Her heart was unaccountably light and glad,
like a girl's heart. It was the Eve of Mary when all women are blest
because of one. The Wise Men brought gifts to the Child; Letty had
often brought hers timidly, devoutly, trustfully, and perhaps to-night
they were coming back to her!

[Illustration]

VIII

"Put the things down on the front steps," said Dick to the driver as
he neared the parsonage. "If there's nobody at home I'll go on up to
the church after I've got this stuff inside."

"Got a key?"

"No, don't need one. I've picked all the locks with a