serve them wherever they were. This she had told them often. How
different was such a woman from Phoebe or Molly Tooney! How happy would
she be if there had been such a one in her mother's family, and were she
with her now!

"But I have only Ralph," thought Miriam; "no one else in the world."
Ralph was good,--no human being could be better; but he was only one
person, and knew nothing of many things she wanted to know, and could not
help her in many ways in which she needed to be helped.

With a feeling that from certain points of view she was rather solitary
and somewhat forsaken, she went to look for her brother. It would be
better to talk to what she had than to think about what she had not.

As she walked toward the barn and pasture fields, Ralph came up from the
cornfield by the woods on the other side of the house. As he went in he
met Mrs. Drane and La Fleur, who had just come downstairs. Cicely had
already retired to her work. At the sight of the gentleman, who, she was
informed, was the master of the house, La Fleur bowed her head, cast down
her eyes, smiled and courtesied.

Mrs. Drane drew Ralph aside.

"That is La Fleur, who used to be our cook. She is a kind old body, who
takes the greatest interest in our welfare. She is greatly pleased to
find us in such delightful quarters, but she has queer notions, and now
she wants very much to call on your cook. I don't know that this is the
right thing, and I have been looking for your sister, to ask her if she
objects to it, but I think she is not in the house."

"Oh, bless me!" exclaimed Ralph, "she will not mind in the least. Let the
good woman go down and see Molly Tooney, and if she can give her some
points about cooking, I am sure we shall all be delighted."

"Oh, she would not do that," said Mrs. Drane. "She is a very considerate
person; but I suppose, in any house, her instincts would naturally draw
her toward the cook."

When Ralph turned to La Fleur, and assured her that his sister would be
glad to have her visit the kitchen, the old woman, who had not taken her
eyes from him for an instant, thanked him with great unction, again
bowed, courtesied, smiled, and, being shown the way to the kitchen,
descended.

Molly Tooney, who was sitting on a low stool, paring potatoes, looked up
in amazement at the person who entered her kitchen. It was not an
obsequious old woman she saw, but a sedate, dignified, elderly person,
with her brows somewhat knitted.