nto before winter sets in. Won't it be lovely? Oh, mother,
aren't you glad?"

Mrs. Carlyle was more than glad. She was thankful. Her mind was relieved
of a care which had increased as the days sped on. Now her girls would
have companionship, and with friends whose influence and example would be
all for good. Tom, too, would have a companion. And, perhaps, who knows,
they could share their lessons too. Mrs. Carlyle's thoughts flew on; but
her thoughts were all for her children. She had not yet considered what
it would mean to herself,--the companionship, the kind friends at hand in
case of need.

"You are very, very glad about it, aren't you, dear?" she asked, her heart
and her eyes full of sympathy with her child's gladness.

"Glad! Oh, mother. I was never so happy in my life. It seems now as
though everything is just perfect!"

"And granny? Have you given up wanting to go back to her, dear?"

A shadow fell on Audrey's happiness. "Granny was speaking about it,"
she said hurriedly, "only yesterday, and I told her I could not come.
I thought I was--I felt I ought to stay here, even after you are well
again, for there is a lot to do, and--and, mother--you don't think I must
go back, do you?"

Her voice was full of anxiety. She had little dreamed at one time that
she would ever be overjoyed at being told she could not do so; but now.
Her eyes sought her mother's face anxiously. She longed to hear her say
reassuringly that there was not the slightest need, that she could not be
spared.

But for a moment Mrs. Carlyle did not answer at all, and when she did she
spoke slowly and hesitatingly. "I hardly know, dear, what to say.
As she is at present, there is no actual need, and I am glad, for I don't
know what we should do without you here. But, well, I feel I could not
grudge her one--when I have so many, and she is so lonely. You could be
such a comfort to her, Audrey."

Audrey's face grew white and hard. "Of course," she thought bitterly,
"it was only for her to feel happy for life to seem jollier and more full
of happy prospects than ever before, and she must be dragged away from it
all."

If she had been asked what, above all else, she would have chosen, she
would have asked for just this: that Irene should come to live close by;
and she was really coming. Better still, they were all of them coming,
and life, for one brief moment, had seemed full of sunshine. "So, of
course, a black and heav