Pete stirred.

"But, Mr. William," he stammered thickly; "how are you--what'll you do
without--There doesn't nobody but me know so well about your tea, and
the two lumps in your coffee; and there's your flannels that you never
put on till I get 'em out, and the woolen socks that you'd wear all
summer if I didn't hide 'em. And--and who's goin' to take care of
these?" he finished, with a glance that encompassed the overflowing
cabinets and shelves of curios all about him.

His master smiled sadly. An affection that had its inception in his
boyhood days shone in his eyes. The hand in which the Lowestoft had
shaken rested now heavily on an old man's bent shoulder--a shoulder that
straightened itself in unconscious loyalty under the touch.

"Pete, you have spoiled me, and no mistake. I don't expect to find
another like you. But maybe if I wear the woolen socks too late you'll
come and hunt up the others for me. Eh?" And, with a smile that was
meant to be quizzical, William turned and began to shift the teapots
about again.

"But, Mr. William, why--that is, what will Mr. Bertram and Miss Billy
do--without you?" ventured the old man.

There was a sudden tinkling crash. On the floor lay the fragments of a
silver-luster teapot.

The servant exclaimed aloud in dismay, but his master did not even
glance toward his once treasured possession on the floor.

"Nonsense, Pete!" he was saying in a particularly cheery voice. "Have
you lived all these years and not found out that newly-married folks
don't _need_ any one else around? Come, do you suppose we could begin
to pack these teapots to-night?" he added, a little feverishly. "Aren't
there some boxes down cellar?"

"I'll see, sir," said Pete, respectfully; but the expression on his face
as he turned away showed that he was not thinking of teapots--nor of
boxes in which to pack them.

CHAPTER III. BILLY SPEAKS HER MIND

Mr. and Mrs. Bertram Henshaw were expected home the first of September.
By the thirty-first of August the old Beacon Street homestead facing
the Public Garden was in spick-and-span order, with Dong Ling in the
basement hovering over a well-stocked larder, and Pete searching the
rest of the house for a chair awry, or a bit of dust undiscovered.

Twice before had the Strata--as Bertram long ago dubbed the home of
his boyhood--been prepared for the coming of Billy, William's namesake:
once, when it had been decorated with guns and fishing-rods to w