isten, child--that isn't half all. It seems that on the same
train was a young man from North Hero whom I had always known--and
liked. But Aunt Sabrina had never approved of him, and long before she
had forbidden his coming here. I did see him sometimes, though--I
loved company and he was entertaining. There had never been more than
a pleasant friendship between us, and I had not dreamed that he was
going to Burlington on that train. He was killed. And when I came
back from the hospital the story was on every tongue that I had been
running away with Charlie Prince!"

"Oh, I was hurt in every part of me--my body and my soul and my mind!
My precious dreams had crumbled forever and ever. And I had to face
that dreadful scandal! Not that I ever saw a soul--Sabrina took care
of _that_! She kept me shut up as though I had the plague. But
through her reproachful eyes I was made to see the accusations of every
man, woman and child on the Hero Islands. And I couldn't _make_ her
believe it wasn't so! She simply wouldn't talk about it. She went
around with that dreadful look, day after day, and when she'd say
anything at all, it was about how I had brought shame to the Leavitt
name. And after awhile I began to feel as though I _had_ done
something--more than just run away to study music. She made me
understand that the only way I could atone for it all was by burying
myself within these four walls."

"Then _that's_ what she means by 'making your bed.'"

"Yes, dear, I was so crushed that I came to believe she was right. God
knew that all I had wanted when I went away was a right to my own way
of living, but His ways are inscrutable and His Will has to be done!
Sabrina called it the sword of wrath and the justice of the Almighty,
and it didn't make much difference to me _what_ it was called--I was
here. That's my story, dear, that's the way I've lived until--to-day.
But you've changed it. Something inside of me that I thought was
dead--isn't dead at all! Do you know what I told Sabrina? I told her
I didn't _care_ what she thought, that I guessed when a woman was forty
years old and over she could decide things for herself and if just
going out there in the orchard was wicked, then I'd go on being
_wickeder_! That's what I told her. Dear, dear, you should have seen
her face!"

"Hurrah, hurrah, Aunt Milly!"

"Poor Sabrina, I never spoke like that in my life to her! I've always
been so--_afraid_, until to-d