anding holding those things while he talked on a
February morning. He'd have gone home and taken some pepper-tea to ward
off the effects of the chill!"

"There's Benson's," Roberta interrupted, "and it's open. Why, look at
the people in front of the windows! Look at the windows themselves.
There must be a new firm. Poor Hugh!"

"There's a new sign over the old one; a '_Successors to_,' I think; but
Benson's name is on it, '_Benson & Company_,'" announced Ruth, straining
her eyes to make it out.

"Somebody must have come to the rescue," said Uncle Rufus with joyous
interest. "Well, well; the thing has been kept surprisingly still, and I
can't think who it can be, but I'm certainly glad. I hated to see the
boy fail. I suppose you all want to go in?"

They unquestionably did, but they wanted first to sit still and look at
the windows from their vantage point above the passers-by on foot, who
were all stopping as they came along. It was small wonder that they
should stop. The town of Eastman had never in its experience seen within
its borders window displays like these.

Benson's possessed the advantage of having larger fronts of clear
plate-glass than any store in town. As it was a corner store, there were
not only two big windows on the front but one equally large upon the
side. Each of these showed an artful arrangement of fresh and alluring
white goods, and in the centre of each was a special scheme arranged
with figures and furnishings to form a charming tableau. In one was the
sewing-room scene, adapted from that one which had first challenged
Richard's interest in his grandfather's store; in a second a children's
tea-party drew many admiring comments from the crowd; and in the side
window the figure of a pretty bride with veil and orange blossoms
suggested that the surrounding draperies were fit for uses such as hers.
The clever adaptability of Carson's art showed in the fact that the
figure wore no longer the costly French robe with which she had been
draped when she stood in a glass case at _Kendrick & Company's_, but a
delicate frock of simpler materials, such as any village girl might
afford, yet so cunningly fashioned that a princess might have worn it as
well, and not have been ashamed.

Aunt Ruth and her nieces went enthusiastically in, and Uncle Rufus,
declaring that he must go also and congratulate Hugh on this
extraordinary transformation, tied his horses across the street where
they could not interf