set the table?" she asked.

But Harriet never suspected. Nor again, that evening while she and
Austen read under the lamp, did Harriet know that Alexina, standing at
the open parlour window gazing at the children playing on the
sidewalk, was fighting back passionate tears of an outraged love and a
baffling sense of injustice.

All at once a child's treble came in from the pavement.

"Can't you come play?"

Alexina turned, with backward look of eager inquiry to her aunt, who
had come behind her to see who called.

"As you please; go if you want," said Harriet good-humouredly.

Austen, too, glanced out. Tip-toe on the stone curbing of the iron
fence perched a little girl, spokesman for the group of children
behind her.

"Who is the child?" he asked his sister.

"Her name is Carringford. She is a grand-daughter of the old Methodist
minister who lives at the corner; secretary of his church board, or
something, isn't he? I've noticed two or three little Carringfords
playing in the yard as I go by, and all of them handsome."

Austen placed them at once. The child's mother was the daughter of the
old minister, and, with husband and children, lived in the little
brown house with him. An interest in the details of the human affairs
about him was an unexpected phase in Austen's character. He liked to
know what a man was doing, his income, his habits, his family ties.

"I know Carringford," he remarked; "he is book-keeper for Williams, a
good, steady man. As you say, a handsome child, exceedingly so."

Harriet watched until the little niece joined the group outside.
"Gregarious little creatures they seem to be," she remarked. There was
good-humour in her tone, but there was no understanding.

The next day was Sunday. On Monday it rained. Tuesday evening Alexina
stood at the parlour window as before, looking out. The little figure
looked very solitary.

"May I go play?" suddenly she asked. The voice was low, there was no
note even of wistfulness, it was merely the question. There are
children who suffer silently.

"Why not?" Harriet rejoined, looking up from her magazine. She was the
last person to restrict any one needlessly.

The little niece went forth. The children had not come for her again.
Perhaps they did not want her, but, even with this fear upon her, go
she must.

At the gate she paused and with the big house in its immaculate yard
behind her, gazed up and down.

It was a quiet street with the house