murmured. She took a daguerreotype from the
upper drawer, and gazed at it curiously. "Yes, I expect he's changed
quite a good deal," she repeated, with a sigh.

IV

"Why, mother Moxom!"

Mrs. Weaver sank into her sewing-chair in an attitude of pulpy despair.

"Well, I don't see but what it's the best thing for me to do," asserted
the old woman. "The cold weather'll be coming on soon, and I always have
more or less rheumatism, and they say Californay's good for rheumatism.
Besides, I think I need to stir round a little; I've stayed right here
'most too close; and as long as Ethel has her heart set on going, I
don't see but what it's the best plan. If I go along with her, I can
make sure that everything's all right. If you and Jason say she can't
go, why, then, I don't see but what I'll just have to start off and make
the trip alone."

"Why, mother Moxom, I just don't know what to say!"

Mrs. Weaver's tone conveyed a deep-seated sense of injury that she
should thus be deprived of speech for such insufficient cause.

"'Tisn't such a very hard trip," pursued the old woman doggedly. "They
say you get on one of them through trains and take your provision and
your knitting, and just live along the road. It isn't as if you had to
change cars at every junction, and get so turned round you don't know
which way your head's set on your shoulders."

Mrs. Weaver's expression began to dissolve into reluctant interest in
these details.

"Well, of course, if you think it'll help your rheumatism, and you've
got your mind made up to go, _some_body'll have to go with you. Have you
asked Jason?"

"No, I haven't." Mrs. Moxom's voice took on an edge. "I can't see just
why I've got to ask people; sometimes I think I'm about old enough to do
as I please."

"Why, of course, mother," soothed the daughter-in-law. "Would you go and
see the girls before you'd start?"

"No, I don't believe I would," answered the old woman, her voice
relaxing under this acquiescence. "They'd only make a fuss. They've
both got good homes and good men, and they're married to them right and
lawful, and there's nothing to worry about. Besides, I'd just get
interested in the children, and that'd make it harder. I've done the
best I knew how by the girls, and I don't know as they've got any reason
to complain"--

"Why, no, mother," interrupted the daughter-in-law, with rising
feathers, "I never heard anybody say but what you'd done well by all
your child