y at her sister's splendor.

"Do you think you'll get it finished for the Fiesta, maw?" she asked,
between deep breaths of admiration. Mrs. Burson nodded absently,
exploring her bosom for another pin with her outspread palm.

Her husband came into the room, and seated himself on the edge of the
rep lounge. His face had a strange pallor above the mask of his beard.

"You're home early, Erastus," she said; then she looked up. "Are you
sick?" she asked with anxiety.

"Mr. Anthony is dead," Burson said huskily.

"Dead! Why, Erastus!"

Mrs. Burson held a pin suspended in the air and stared at her husband.

"Yes. He dropped dead in his chair. Or rather, he had some kind of a
stroke, and never came to. It happened more than a week ago. I went in
to-day, and Rufus told me."

Mrs. Burson returned the pin to her bosom, and motioned her daughter
toward the bedroom door.

"Go and take it off, Millie," she said soberly. She was shamefacedly
conscious of something different from the grief that stirred her
husband, something more sordid and personal.

"It hurt me all over," Burson went on, "the way some of them talked in
town. They looked queer at me when I said what I did about him. I don't
understand it."

"I guess there's a good many things you don't understand, Erastus,"
ventured the wife quietly.

A carriage stopped at the gate, and a young woman alighted from it, and
came up the walk. Erastus saw her first, and met her in the open
doorway. She looked at him with eager intentness.

"Is this Mr. Burson?" she asked gently. "I am Mr. Anthony's daughter."

Mrs. Burson got up, holding the scraps of green silk in her apron, and
offered the visitor a seat. Erastus held out his hand, and tried to
speak. The two faced each other in tearful silence.

"I wanted to bring you this myself," the girl faltered,
"because--because of what is written on the outside." She held a package
of papers toward him. "I have heard him speak of you, I think. Any
friend of my father must be a good man. We want to thank you, my mother
and I"--

"To thank me?" Erastus questioned, "to thank me! You certainly don't
know"--

"I know you were my father's friend," the girl interrupted; "I don't
care about the rest. Possibly I couldn't understand it. I know very
little about business, but I knew my father."

She got up, holding her head high in grief-stricken pride, and gave her
hand to her host and hostess.

The younger Burson girl emerged fr