t to have the whole place by rights--"

Mrs. Ellison directed an inquiring glance at her husband.

"She's been complaining that way ever since I bought it," he said.

"And gran' was sick and I thought she'd like some of the trout,"
continued the girl. "She's got rheumatics and can't work this week, you
know."

"But wouldn't it have been better to ask?" queried Mrs. Ellison, kindly.
"Didn't you feel kind of as though it was wrong, eating something you
had no right to take?"

"I didn't," answered the girl, promptly. "I didn't eat any. I was going
to, though, till gran' said what she did--"

"Then you haven't had anything to eat to-day?" asked Mrs. Ellison,
feeling a sudden moisture in her own eyes.

"No," said the girl.

"And what makes your dress so wet? Did you fall in?"

"No-o-o," exclaimed the girl. "I swam the pool. And I did it all the way
under water. I didn't think I could, and I almost died holding my breath
so long. But I did it."

There was a touch of pride in her tone.

"James," said Mrs. Ellison. "Leave her to me. I'll say all that's
needed, I don't think she'll do it again."

"Indeed I won't--truly," said Bess Thornton.

Farmer Ellison walked to the door, with half a twinkle in his eye.
"Clear across the pool under water," he muttered to himself. "Sure
enough, I didn't need them burdock bitters."

A few minutes later, Bess Thornton, seated at the breakfast table in the
Ellison home, was eating the best meal she had had in many a day. A
motherly-looking woman, setting out a few extra dainties for her, wiped
her eyes now and again with a corner of her apron.

"She'd have been about her age," she whispered to herself once softly,
and bent and gave the girl a kiss.

When Bess Thornton left the house, she carried a basket on one arm that
made Grannie Thornton stare in amazement when she looked within.

"No, no," she said, all of a tremble, as the girl drew forth some of the
delicacies, and offered them to her. "Not a bit of it for me. I'll not
touch it. You can. And see here, don't go up on the hill again, do you
hear? Keep away from the Ellisons'."

She had such a strange, excited, almost frightened way with her that the
child urged her no further, but put the basket away, put of her sight.

"Mrs. Ellison asked me to come again," she said to herself, sighing. "I
don't see why gran' should care."

CHAPTER V

SOME CAUSES OF TROUBLE

It was early of a Saturday afternoon, warm and