less than her
grateful affection for her aunt, made such behavior impossible. Softly
she stole out of the room and noiselessly closed the door behind her.

A half-hour later, when her aunt and cousins had gone to bed, and while
the august School Board still occupied the parlor, Tillie sat sewing in
the sitting-room, while the doctor, at the other side of the table,
nodded over his newspaper.

Since Tillie had come to live at the hotel, she and the doctor were
often together in the evening; the Doc was fond of a chat over his pipe
with the child whom he so helped and befriended in her secret struggles
to educate herself. There was, of course, a strong bond of sympathy and
friendship between them in their common conspiracy with Miss Margaret,
whom the doctor had never ceased to hold in tender memory.

Just now Tillie's ears were strained to catch the sounds of the
adjourning of the Board. When at last she heard their shuffling
footsteps in the hall, her heart beat fast with suspense. A moment more
and the door leading from the parlor opened and Fairchilds came out
into the sitting-room.

Tillie did not lift her eyes from her sewing, but the room seemed
suddenly filled with his presence.

"Well!" the doctor roused himself to greet the young man; "were you
'lected?"

Breathlessly, Tillie waited to hear his answer.

"Oh, yes; I've escaped alive!" Fairchilds leaned against the table in
an attitude of utter relaxation. "They roasted me brown, though!
Galileo at Rome, and Martin Luther at Worms, had a dead easy time
compared to what I've been through!"

"I guess!" the doctor laughed. "Ain't!"

"I'm going to bed," the teacher announced in a tone of collapse. "Good
night!"

"Good night!" answered the doctor, cordially.

Fairchilds drew himself up from the table and took a step toward the
stairway; this brought him to Tillie's side of the table, and he paused
a moment and looked down upon her as she sewed.

Her fingers trembled, and the pulse in her throat beat suffocatingly,
but she did not look up.

"Good night, Miss--Tillie, isn't it?"

"Matilda Maria," Tillie's soft, shy voice replied as her eyes, full of
light, were raised, for an instant, to the face above her.

The man smiled and bowed his acknowledgment; then, after an instant's
hesitation, he said, "Pardon me: the uniform you and Mrs. Wackernagel
wear--may I ask what it is?"

"'Uniform'?" breathed Tillie, wonderingly. "Oh, you mean the garb? We
are