ome unaccountable oversight, Mrs. Royden had let the
spare-rib cook a little too hard and brown on one side. Everything had
gone wrong with her that day, and when the family came home they found
her flushed and fretful.

"Hepsy," said she, "do you change your dress as soon as you can, and
help me set the table. Put on your apron, Sarah, the first thing. Why do
you scream out so loud, Lizzie? You almost craze me!"

"Why, there comes Chester, in Mr. Kerchey's buggy! He is beckoning for
Sam to go and open the gate, I guess."

Mrs. Royden was interested. She had a liking for wealthy young men, and
was not displeased to see Mr. Kerchey drive into the yard. Hastily
taking off an old tire, assumed to protect her dress, she bustled about
to prepare herself to do credit to the family.

"Take him right into the parlor, Sarah," said she. "Willie, you may keep
on your new clothes, if you will stay in the house. If you get into the
dirt, I shall box your ears."

"I wonder what Chester invited that disagreeable old bach to stop for?"
murmured Sarah, not so well pleased.

She received him politely, however. Mr. Kerchey, in her presence, was
painfully stiff and incapable of words. His position would have been
most embarrassing, had not Chester come to his relief. Afterwards Father
Brighthopes made his appearance, and Sarah, begging to be excused, was
seen no more until supper was announced.

Hepsy, Sam and the two younger children, stayed away from the table; the
first from choice, the others from compulsion. The little boys
especially were hungry, and made a great clamor because they could not
sit down.

"Do let them come, wife!" said Mr. Royden. "There is plenty of room."

"May we?" asked Willie, with big grief in his voice, and big tears in
his pleading eyes.

"No; you can wait just as well," replied Mrs. Royden. "If you tease or
cry, remember what we do with little boys that will not be good. Hush,
now!"

Notwithstanding this dark hint of the closet, Willie burst into tears,
and lifted up his voice in lamentation.

"Hepsy!" cried Mrs. Royden, "take him into the kitchen."

Extreme severity transformed Willie's grief into rage. The cake which
had been given him as a slight compensation and comfort for the
martyrdom of waiting he threw upon the floor, and crushed beneath his
feet.

Mrs. Royden started up, with fire in her eyes; but her husband stayed
her.

"Who blames the boy?" he said. "He is hungry and cross. Com