nt alone together. It seemed to Katie that the talks
they had at such times, in the keen, clear winter air, were different
from the talks they sometimes fell into sitting by the fireside, when
all the rest had gone to bed and they had the home to themselves. Under
the bright sunshine they seemed to get away from Gershom and its news
and its troubles and vexations, into a wider and brighter world, and
some of the things that Miss Elizabeth said to her then, Katie told
herself she would never forget while she lived.

There were visitors now and then, and at such times, if they were
strangers to her, Katie took her book into a corner, or into Sally's
bright kitchen, and read it there; but if the visitors were her friends
as well, she stayed and enjoyed their visits also. Just one thing
happened that it was not pleasant to think about afterward. Indeed it
had been very unpleasant at the time, and Katie had some trouble in
deciding whether or not she should say anything about it to grannie and
her mother when she went home.

This was a visit made one day to Elizabeth by Mrs Jacob Holt. Katie
did not go away this time, because she was afraid it might not please
her friend, but she did not join in the conversation. She sat beyond
the flower-stand in the bay-window, reading and knitting; but she was
not so interested in her book as not to hear something of what was said.
Mrs Jacob told some village news, and then spoke about Clifton, and
about a new dress that was to be finished for her to-day, and much more
of the same kind.

It was not Mrs Jacob's fault that the conversation took the turn it
did. It was the squire, who questioned her about Jacob, and about
various matters connected with their business; and then he said
something about Silas Bean, who had got hurt in his employment, and the
difficulty was to make him understand what Silas Bean should be doing at
the Varney place with two yoke of oxen, and what Jacob had to do with
it. Elizabeth reminded him that Jacob had bought the Varney place, and
that Mark Varney had gone away, and tried to end the discussion of the
matter. But Mrs Jacob went still on to remind him of the Gershom
Manufacturing Company, that would no doubt be formed by and by, and how
Jacob hated to have time lost, and was taking advantage of the snow to
have stones and timber drawn that would be needed in the building of the
new dam; and that was the way that Silas Bean came to be there with his