week through. I can't make him
out at all. Sometimes I think he's glad I told him all those things in
the parlor that day I dressed up in Marie's things, and sometimes I
think he's sorry and wished I hadn't.

The very next morning he came down to breakfast with such a funny look
on his face. He said good-morning to me three times, and all through
breakfast he kept looking over at me with a kind of scowl that was not
cross at all--just puzzled.

After breakfast he didn't go out to the observatory, not even into the
library. He fidgeted around the dining-room till Aunt Jane went out
into the kitchen to give her orders to Susie; then he burst out, all
of a sudden:

"Well, Mary, what shall we do to-day?" Just like that he said it, as
if we'd been doing things together every day of our lives.

"D-do?" I asked; and I know I showed how surprised I was by the way I
stammered and flushed up.

"Certainly, do," he answered, impatient and scowling. "What shall we
do?"

"Why, Father, I--I don't know," I stammered again.

"Come, come, of course you know!" he cried. "You know what you want to
do, don't you?"

I shook my head. I was so astonished I couldn't even think. And when
you can't think you certainly can't talk.

"Nonsense, Mary," scowled Father again. "Of course you know what
you want to do! What are you in the habit of doing with your young
friends--your Carries and Charlies, and all the rest?"

I guess I just stood and stared and didn't say anything; for after a
minute he cried: "Well--well--well? I'm waiting."

"Why, we--we walk--and talk--and play games," I began; but right away
he interrupted.

"Good! Very well, then, we'll walk. I'm not Carrie or Charlie, but I
believe I can walk and talk--perhaps even play games. Who knows? Come,
get your hat."

And I got my hat, and we went.

But what a funny, funny walk that was! He meant to make it a good one;
I know he did. And he tried. He tried real hard. But he walked so
fast I couldn't half keep up with him; then, when he saw how I was
hurrying, he'd slow down, 'way down, and look so worried--till he'd
forget and go striding off again, way ahead of me.

We went up on the hill through the Benton woods, and it was perfectly
lovely up there. He didn't say much at first. Then, all of a sudden,
he began to talk, about anything and everything. And I knew, by the
way he did it, that he'd just happened to think he'd got to talk.

And how he talked! He asked me was