equal to the
occasion.

"How be you to-day?" the guest asked kindly, as she entered the
kitchen. "Why, what a sight o' flowers, Mis' Bickford! What be you
goin' to do with 'em all?"

Mrs. Bickford wore a grave expression as she glanced over her
spectacles. "My sister's boy fetched 'em over," she answered. "You
know my sister Parsons's a great hand to raise flowers, an' this boy
takes after her. He said his mother thought the gardin never looked
handsomer, and she picked me these to send over. They was sendin' a
team to Westbury for some fertilizer to put on the land, an' he come
with the men, an' stopped to eat his dinner 'long o' me. He's been
growin' fast, and looks peaked. I expect sister 'Liza thought the
ride, this pleasant day, would do him good. 'Liza sent word for me to
come over and pass some days next week, but it ain't so that I can."

"Why, it's a pretty time of year to go off and make a little visit,"
suggested the neighbor encouragingly.

"I ain't got my sitting-room chamber carpet taken up yet," sighed
Mrs. Bickford. "I do feel condemned. I might have done it to-day, but
't was all at end when I saw Tommy coming. There, he's a likely boy,
an' so relished his dinner; I happened to be well prepared. I don't
know but he's my favorite o' that family. Only I've been sittin' here
thinkin', since he went, an' I can't remember that I ever was so
belated with my spring cleaning."

"'T was owin' to the weather," explained Miss Pendexter. "None of us
could be so smart as common this year, not even the lazy ones that
always get one room done the first o' March, and brag of it to others'
shame, and then never let on when they do the rest."

The two women laughed together cheerfully. Mrs. Bickford had put up
the wide leaf of her large table between the windows and spread out
the flowers. She was sorting them slowly into three heaps.

"Why, I do declare if you haven't got a rose in bloom yourself!"
exclaimed Miss Pendexter abruptly, as if the bud had not been
announced weeks before, and its progress regularly commented upon.
"Ain't it a lovely rose? Why, Mis' Bickford!"

"Yes 'm, it's out to-day," said Mrs. Bickford, with a somewhat
plaintive air. "I'm glad you come in so as to see it."

The bright flower was like a face. Somehow, the beauty and life of it
were surprising in the plain room, like a gay little child who might
suddenly appear in a doorway. Miss Pendexter forgot herself and her
hostess and the