t had slipped out in a curiously unpremeditated fashion. There was
something about the little girl--perhaps it was the fact of her having
come so far, and being an orphan--that moved Recompense Gardiner.

"I didn't know any real little girls," answered Doris modestly, "except
the farmer's children. They worked out of doors in the summer in the
fields."

"And I was the youngest of five sisters," said Miss Recompense. "There
were three boys."

"It would be so nice to have a sister of one's very own. There were
Sallie and Helen Jewett on the vessel."

"I think I like the sisters to be older," said Betty archly. "There are
the weddings and the nieces and nephews. And they are always begging you
to visit them."

"And I had no sisters," said Uncle Win, as if he would fain console
Doris for her loneliness.

She glanced up with sympathetic sweetness. He was a little puzzled at
the intuitive process.

"Fix up the fire, Warren. Your mother and father will be cold when they
get in."

Warren gave the burned log a poke, and it fell in two ends, neither
dropping over the andirons. Then he pushed them a little nearer and a
shower of sparks flew about.

"Oh, how beautiful!" and Doris leaned over intently.

Warren placed a large log back of them, then he piled on some smaller
split pieces. They began to blaze shortly. He picked up the turkey's
wing and brushed around the stone hearth.

"That was very well done," remarked Miss Recompense approvingly.

"Warren knows how to make a fire," said his uncle, "and it is quite an
art."

"That is a sign he will make a good husband," commented Betty. "And I
shall get a bad one, for my fires go out half the time."

"You are too heedless," said Miss Recompense.

"Now, we ought to tell some ghost stories," suggested Warren. "Or we
could wait until it gets a little darker. The sun is going down, and the
fire is coming up, and just see how they are fighting at the Spanish
Armada. Uncle Win, when you break up housekeeping you can leave me that
picture."

They all turned to look at the picture in the cross light, with one of
the wonderful fleet ablaze from the broadside of her enemy. It was a
vigorous if somewhat crude painting by a Dutch artist.

"Oh, Uncle Win," cried Betty; "do you really think there will be war
when we have a new President?"

"I sincerely hope not."

"We ought to have an Armada. Well, I don't know either," continued
Warren dubiously. "If it should go to piece