ider it grew, until from north to south, and almost as far up as
the zenith, were thrust its shining sticks. Then out of the cold mist
floating over the distant Sioux showed a copper segment of the moon,
which rose into sight and careened slowly heavenward, lighting up the
wide plains, glimmering on the placid water of the sloughs, and shining
full into the face of the dreaming little girl.

* * * * *

ONLY the neighbor woman was at the farm-house next day to comfort the
little girl and help her through the sad hours. There was no sign of the
pig-wagon all morning, and as the afternoon passed slowly away the
little girl ceased to strain her eyes along the road leading to the
school-house, and never left her mother's side. It was the neighbor
woman who, not daring to leave the room even to do the chores about the
barn and coops, looked south every few moments with the hope that the
biggest brother would return before it was too late.

As the day drew toward its close the sun, which had been lurking sulkily
behind the clouds, came out brightly and shone into the sitting-room,
where its beams lay across the foot of the canopied bed like a warm
coverlet. The room was robbed of its gloom, and the little girl's
mother opened her eyes and looked about her, long and thoughtfully, as
one gazes upon a loved scene that is drifting from sight.

The walls were hung with spatter-work that the biggest brother had done,
and with photographs and magazine pictures in splint frames. Over the
front door was tacked the first yarn motto that the little girl had ever
worked. It was faded, but her mother, though her eyes were dimming,
could read the uneven line: "God Bless Our Home." The new cane-seated
chairs were set about against the walls, and a bright blue cover hid the
round, oak center-table. The eldest brother's violin lay in its case on
the organ that had come into the house the month before when the wheat
was sold. Up on the clock-shelf was a Dresden shepherd in stately pose
before his dainty shepherdess. The curtains on the windows hung white
and soft to the carpet.

Presently the mother asked to be raised on her pillow, and the neighbor
woman and the little girl turned the bed so that she could look out of
the windows at the setting sun.

The western heavens rioted in a fuller beauty that afternoon than had
the eastern half at moon-rise the night before. As the sun sank behind
the clouds piled h