tle sugar pills?"

"No, indeed they were not," said Miriam, very decidedly.

"I've made a fire in the parlor," said Phoebe, coming in, "if you all
want to sit there afore you go to bed."

"I don't want to sit anywhere," cried Miriam, "and I am crazy to get a
peep out of doors. Come on, Ralph, just for a minute."

Ralph followed her out on the piazza.

"It's awfully dark," said Miriam, "but if we walk carefully, I think we
can get far enough away from the house to look up at it, and find out a
little what it looks like."

They groped their way across the driveway, and on to the grass beyond.

"We can see a good deal of it against the sky!" exclaimed Miriam. "What
tall pillars! It looks like a Greek temple in front. And from what I can
make out, it's pretty much all front."

"I suppose it is a regular old-fashioned house," said her brother,
"with a Grecian portico front, and perhaps another at the back. But you
must come in now, for you have on neither hat nor wrap." And he took
her by the hand.

"It isn't cold," said Miriam, "and oh, Ralph, look up at the stars. Those
are our stars, every one of them."

Ralph laughed, as he led her into the house.

"Yes, indeed," she insisted, "we own all the way down, and all the way
up."

"Now then," said Miriam, when they had closed the door behind them, "how
shall we explore the house? Shall we each take a lamp, or will candles
be better?"

"Little girl!" exclaimed her brother, "I had no idea that you were such a
bunch of watch springs. It is nearly nine o'clock, and after the day's
work that you have done, it is time you were in bed. House exploring can
be done to-morrow."

"Yes, indeed, Miss," said Phoebe, who stood by, anxious to shut up the
house and retire to her own domicile, "and I will go up into your room
with you and show you about things."

Half an hour after this, Miriam came out of her bedroom, holding a bit of
lighted candle in her hand. She was dressed, with the exception of her
shoes. Softly she advanced to the foot of the stairs which led to the
floor above.

"They are partly my stairs," she said to herself, as she paused for a
moment at the bottom of the step. "Ralph told me that he considered the
place as much mine as his, and I have a right to go up. I cannot go to
sleep without seeing what is up here. I never imagined such a third floor
as this one."

In less than a minute, Miriam was slowly creeping along the next floor of
the house, which