if I
can only have one, I'll take her, if she'll let me. Will your
'schoolma'am' let you come away with me? I'd like to have you until
to-morrow, and I'll get you back safe and sound."

Nancy laughed. Six months before, if anyone had told her that she
would be going to visit her Uncle Thomas on that particular day, she
would have thought the prophet quite mad; as it was she could hardly
believe her ears.

"I'd _love_ to do it. Here's the school now--it won't take me a minute
to get ready. You speak to Miss Leland, Uncle Thomas. I'm quite sure
that I can go."

A little more than an hour later Nancy found herself turning in the
very old gate through the unfriendly bars of which she and Alma had
peered on that distant rainy afternoon, feeling that they were gazing
into a forbidden country. Yet now nothing, it seemed, could be more
natural than that she should be sitting beside her uncle, chatting away
with him unconstrainedly. Only the fact that he never mentioned her
mother, nor suggested that she should even peep into the little brown
house, made her feel uncomfortable. Furthermore, he showed the same
coldness on the subject of Alma, so that, in a way, Nancy felt that
somehow she had almost unfairly won his affection for herself alone,
and that she was enjoying a pleasure in which her mother and sister
should have had an equal share. On the other hand, she decided, at
length, to say nothing either to Alma or to Mrs. Prescott about her
visit; only because she was afraid that the knowledge of it might again
lead them to false hopes, and to follies stimulated by those hopes.
She felt sure that her uncle had come to see her, only because he had
taken her at her word; that is to say, that he counted on her not in
any way misunderstanding the purpose of his visit, or fancying that it
gave promise of his relenting in his long-standing determination not to
solve their financial problems for them.

Aside from the fact that, although within a mile of the little brown
cottage, she might have been a league away, and that she experienced
several bad qualms of homesickness, Nancy thoroughly enjoyed that day.
She lunched with her uncle in the big dining-room, sitting at the head
of his table, while he placed himself at the foot. And afterwards he
showed her about the huge old house, taking her to his laboratory,
explaining a great deal about scientific experiments which she did not
understand, showing her his books and