tiating too much in the direction
of Betty, she added hastily, "But there's one thing I hadn't thought of.
Of course that would make it all right for any kind of a girl, even for
a Gay or a Roberta. _You'd_ be her Prince Charming, so of course you'd
'live happily ever after.'"

Again Jack laughed heartily, lying back in the big Morris chair. Then
reaching out for the paper cutter on the table, he began toying with it
as he often did when he talked. But this time, instead of saying
anything, he sat looking into the fire, slowly drawing the ivory blade
in and out through his closed fingers.

The fore-log burned through, suddenly broke apart between the andirons,
and falling into a bed of glowing coals beneath, sent a puff of ashes
out on to the hearth. Mary leaned forward to reach for the turkey-wing
hanging beside the tongs. There had always been a turkey-wing beside her
Grandmother Ware's fireplace. That is why Mary insisted on using one
now instead of a modern hearth-broom. It suggested so pleasantly the
housewifely thrift and cleanliness of an earlier generation which she
loved to copy. She had prepared this wing herself, stretching and drying
it under a heavy weight, and binding the quill ends into a handle with a
piece of brown ribbon.

[Illustration: "'I WISH WE COULD SETTLE THINGS BY A FEATHER, AS THEY
USED TO IN THE OLD FAIRY TALES.'"]

Now as she flirted it briskly across the hearth, a tiny fluff of down
detached itself from one of the stiff quills, and floated to the rug.
When she picked it up it clung to her fingers, and only after repeated
attempts did she succeed in dislodging it, and in blowing it into the
fire.

"I wish we could settle things by a feather, as they used to in the old
fairy tales," she said wistfully, looking after the bit of down. "Just
say:

"'Feather, feather, when I blow
Point the way that I should go.'

Then there would be no endless worry and waiting and indecision. It
would be up to the feather to settle the matter."

"Why not wish for your 'witch with a wand,' as you used to do?" asked
Jack. "There used to be a time when scarcely a day passed that you did
not make that wish."

Mary's answer was a sudden exclamation and a clasping of her hands
together as she turned towards him, her face radiant.

"Jack, you've given me an idea! Don't you remember that's what we took
to calling Cousin Kate after she gave Joyce that trip abroad, and did so
many lovely thi