ild.

"Sadie's lonesome at the house alone all day, an' it was good of you,
Lizzie, t' ask 'er," he said as he climbed back into the wagon.

Elizabeth wanted a visit with Luther, himself, but was less fearful of a
day with Sadie than she had been. She took her guest into the house and at
the sitting-room door paused to point to Master Jack, who sat on an old
quilt with a pillow at his back, digging his little heels into the floor
and holding out dimpled hands imploringly.

"You darling child!" Sadie cried, going down on her knees at his side and
hugging him till he sent up an indignant howl. "Isn't he cunnin'? Isn't
he?" she cried, releasing him and subsiding into a doubled figure by his
side. "Honestly, Lizzie, why don't you bring him over?"

She looked so insistent, that she had to be answered.

"I don't go any place, Sadie," Elizabeth answered truthfully.

"Is it so, that Mr. Hunter won't take you?" Sadie asked, and then at sight
of the anger in Elizabeth's face rose to her knees and laid her hand on
her arm hastily. "I didn't say that to hurt; honestly, Lizzie, I didn't.
I'm trying not to do that this time."

Elizabeth's indignation was cooled slightly by the genuineness of the
speech, but she did not understand the last sentence till her eye happened
to fall on Sadie's form. In a flash she saw what was meant. Forgetting her
hurt, she was silent from pure delight. She knew what a child would mean
in that home. The other misunderstood her silence and hastened on with her
apologies:

"Honest, Lizzie, I didn't want to hurt, but they do say such mean things
about it that I want you t' know. Why don't you ever take Mrs. Hunter and
th' baby and go t' meetin'?"

Elizabeth's face went white as she realized that she must continue to
answer since she had begun.

"I don't care in the least what they say, Sadie, and I don't want you ever
to mention this to me again," she said sternly.

Sadie's face worked in silent misery till she could control her voice.

"You won't be mad at me, Lizzie? I told Luther I wouldn't be mean t'
nobody till _it_ was born," she said with quivering lip.

Elizabeth took some seconds to consider the thing that had been told to
her. It was of far more importance than the gossip Sadie had just hinted
at, but the gossip must be answered first.

"I won't be mad at you at all," she said after a moment. "That is, I won't
if I never have to listen to such things again. I don't care in the least,