t of her
labors. The rest of the afternoon they passed amicably together on the
sunny porch. She would look up occasionally from her sewing, and say,
"Good doggy!" and David would immediately wag his tail in delighted
response. He was extremely mannerly and appreciative of the slightest
attention--always excepting his enforced ablutions--and he seemed to
approve of the kind eyes of his little protectress as warmly as she
approved of his cool leather nose and speaking ears. As often as he
moved, his license, hitting against the collar buckle, made a safe,
cheerful sound, and Mrs. Nancy felt quite overcome with joy and
gratitude at having been the chosen instrument of his preservation. When
she lighted the lamp in the evening and began her regular game of
backgammon, David curled himself up at her feet in a most companionable
manner, and pricked his ears with interest at the fall of the dice.

But for her backgammon it would be difficult to imagine what Mrs.
Tarbell would have done with her evenings, for her eyes were not strong
enough for reading or sewing. She had got the habit of playing
backgammon with Willie, after he became too weak for more active
occupations, and they had kept the score in a little green blank-book.
After he died she had missed the game, and she had found it pleasant to
take it up again, and to play for both herself and Willie. The score,
too, had been continued in the old book. At the top of each new page she
wrote in her precise old-fashioned hand, "Mother," "Willie," and under
her name all the victories of the "whites" were scored, while those of
the "blacks" were still recorded to Willie's credit. After a while her
eyesight began to fail still more, and it became necessary to lift the
dice and examine them "near to." Then gradually she found that the black
checkers occasionally eluded her, and that she was straining her eyes in
her efforts to see them in the shadowy corners of the board. When at
last she found that by an oversight she had committed a flagrant
injustice to Willie's interests, she felt that something must be done.
Being fertile in resource, she presently bethought herself of the bright
colored wafers she had played with in her childhood, and to her joy she
found they were still to be bought. Having possessed herself of a box of
them, she proceeded to stick a glittering gilt star upon each side of
each checker, both black and white, after which the checkerboard took on
a showy th