y, and the old well with moss on the stones of it. And the hens
themselves, too old to cook, and too old to be laying,--except on the
doorstep in the sunshine, the creatures!--But 'tis home, thanks be to
God."

She lifted her kettle and went slowly back into the house. The hens
followed her to the door, but she shut the lower half of it behind her
and left them outside.

She went to the fireplace and hung the kettle on the hook, blew the
coals to a blaze with a pair of leaky bellows, and sat down before the
fire once more to wait for the water to boil.

She knit round and round her stocking, and there was no sound in the
room but the click-click of her needles, and the tick-tick of the clock,
and the little purring noise of the fire on the hearth.

Just as the kettle began to sing, there was a squawking among the hens
on the doorstep, and two dark heads appeared above the closed half of
the door.

A little girl's voice called out, "How are you at all, Grannie Malone?"

And a little boy's voice said, "We've come to bring you a sup of milk
that Mother sent you."

Grannie Malone jumped out of her chair and ran to the door. "Och, if
it's not the McQueen Twins--the two of them!" she cried. "Bless your
sweet faces! Come in, Larry and Eileen! You are as welcome as the
flowers of spring. And how is your Mother, the day? May God spare her
to her comforts for long years to come!" She swung the door open as she
talked, took the jug from Eileen's hand, and poured the milk into a jug
of her own that stood on the dresser.

"Sure, Mother is well. And how is yourself, Grannie Malone?" Eileen
answered, politely.

"Barring the rheumatism and the asthma, and the old age in my bones, I'm
doing well, thanks be to God," said Grannie Malone. "Sit down by the
fire, now, till I wet a cup of tea and make a cakeen for you! And
indeed it's yourselves can read me a letter from my son Michael, that's
in America! It has been in the house these three days waiting for some
one with the learning to come along by."

She ran to the chair and picked up the letter. The Twins sat down on a
little bench by the fireplace, and Grannie Malone put the letter in
their hands.

"We've not got _all_ the learning yet," Larry said. "We might not be
able to read it."

"You can try," said Grannie Malone.

Then she opened the letter, and a bit of folded green paper with
printing on it fell out. "God bless the boy," she cried, "there's one