into my life!" she said, with a great sigh;
and, evidently, the load of years had rolled from her heart. "And
how grateful I must always be to the kind friends who have brought it
to me and mine. I can never do enough to show you how I appreciate
it all."

Then Hugh thought himself privileged to ask a few questions in turn,
wishing to thoroughly satisfy himself with regard to several points
that were as yet unexplained.

She told them how her husband had lost his life; and that, when she
and the boy faced poverty, the resolution had come to her to go East
and try to find the relatives whom she had only lately learned were
located somewhere near Scranton. She had come across an old and
time-stained diary kept by her mother's father, who, of course, was
the runaway son of Deacon Winslow; and thus she learned how he had
left his home in the heat of anger, and never once communicated with
his parents up to the time of his death, which occurred a short three
years after his marriage.

It was all very simple, and supplied the missing links in the chain.

After she had told them these things once more she asked Hugh about
the aged couple. That was a subject the boy could talk about most
enthusiastically for a whole hour, he was that full of it. And the
happy look on her face told how like balm to her heart his words came.

"And they are coming to see you early this morning," he finally
assured her. "I wouldn't be surprised if either of them has had a
single wink of sleep last night for counting the minutes creep by,
they are that anxious to claim you and Joey."

Just then the doorbell rang. Hugh laughed, as though he had been
expecting such a happening; in fact, he had heard the sound of sleigh
runners without creaking on the hard-frozen snow, and suspected what
it signified.

"There they are this minute!" he exclaimed; "shall I run down and let
them in, Mother? And ought they come right upstairs?"

"Have them take off their wraps first, and warm their hands at the
radiator," she wisely told him, thinking of the invalid who would
soon be in their embrace.

It was a very brief time before he ushered them into the room. First
the old lady was assisted across the floor, for she could hardly
walk, even when so determined to come over, and greet her
granddaughter. And when her arms were twined around the weak little
figure on the bed, and she pressed her to her matronly bosom, Joey's
mother broke down in hyste