by the fireplace, looking thoughtfully at the
bed of coals.

"I'm goin' out," she said briefly. "You keep the fire up."

"Why, Emarine, it's dark. Don't choo want I sh'u'd go along?"

"No; you keep the fire up."

He looked at her anxiously, but he knew from the way she set her heels
down that remonstrance would be useless.

"Don't stay long," he said, in a tone of habitual tenderness. He loved
her passionately, in spite of the lasting hurt she had given him when
she parted him from his mother. It was a hurt that had sunk deeper
than even he realized. It lay heavy on his heart day and night. It
took the blue out of the sky, and the green out of the grass, and the
gold out of the sunlight; it took the exaltation and the rapture out
of his tenderest moments of love.

He never reproached her, he never really blamed her; certainly he
never pitied himself. But he carried a heavy heart around with him,
and his few smiles were joyless things.

For the trouble he blamed only himself. He had promised Emarine
solemnly before he married her, that if there were any "knuckling
down" to be done, his mother should be the one to do it. He had made
the promise deliberately, and he could no more have broken it than he
could have changed the color of his eyes. When bitter feeling arises
between two relatives by marriage, it is the one who stands between
them--the one who is bound by the tenderest ties to both--who has the
real suffering to bear, who is torn and tortured until life holds
nothing worth the having.

Orville Palmer was the one who stood between. He had built his own
cross, and he took it up and bore it without a word.

Emarine hurried through the early winter dark until she came to the
small and poor house where her husband's mother lived. It was off the
main-travelled street.

There was a dim light in the kitchen; the curtain had not been drawn.
Emarine paused and looked in. The sash was lifted six inches, for the
night was warm, and the sound of voices came to her at once. Mrs.
Palmer had company.

"It's Miss Presly," said Emarine, resentfully, under her breath. "Old
gossip!"

"--goin' to have a fine dinner, I hear," Miss Presly was saying.
"Turkey with oyster dressin', an' cranberries, an' mince an' pun'kin
pie, an' reel plum puddin' with brandy poured over 't an' set afire,
an' wine dip, an' nuts an' raisins, an' wine itself to wind up on.
Emarine's a fine cook. She knows how to git up a dinner that makes