be as happy as a queen. You don't believe
it? Try and see.

Gypsy drowned her sorrow at her mother's departure, in broiling her
mutton-chops and cutting her pie, and by the time the coach drove to the
door, and the travelers stood in the entry with bag and baggage, all
ready to start, the smiles had come back to her lips, and the twinkle to
her eyes.

"Good-bye, father! O-oh, mother Breynton, give me another kiss.
There!--one more. Now, if you don't write just as soon as you get
there!"

"Be a good girl, and take nice care of Winnie," called her mother from
the coach-window. And then they were driven rapidly away, and the house
seemed to grow still and dark all at once, and a great many clouds to be
in the warm, autumn sky. The three children stood a moment in the entry
looking forlornly at each other. I beg Tom's pardon--I suppose I should
have said the two children and the "young man." Probably never again in
his life will Tom feel quite as old as he felt in that sixteenth year.
Gypsy was the first to break the dismal silence.

"How horrid it's going to be! You go upstairs and she won't be there,
and there'll be nobody coming home from the store at night, and,
then--you go round, and it's so still, and nobody but me to keep house,
and Patty has just what she likes for breakfast, for all me, and _I_
think Aunt Miranda needn't have gone and been sick, anyway."

"A most sensible and sympathizing niece," observed Tom, in his
patronizing way.

"Well, you see, I suppose I don't care very much about Aunt Miranda,"
said Gypsy, confidentially. "I'm sorry she's sick, but I didn't have a
bit nice time in Boston last vacation, and she scolded me dreadfully
when I blew out the gas. What is it, Patty? Oh, yes--come to dinner,
boys."

"I say," remarked Winnie, at the rather doleful dinner-table, "look
here, Gypsy."

"What?"

[Illustration]

"S'posin' when they'd got Aunt Miranda all nailed into her
coffin--tight in--she should be _un_-deaded, and open her eyes, and
begin--begin to squeal, you know. S'pose they'd let her out?"

Just four days from the morning Mrs. Breynton left, Tom came up from the
office with a very sober face and a letter.

Gypsy ran out to meet him, and put out her hand, in a great hurry to
read it.

"I'll read it to you," said Tom; "it's to me. Come into the parlor."

They went in, and Tom read:

"My Dear Son:

"I write in great haste, just to let you know that your Aunt Miranda