prang to her eyes.

"Let me look at ye; come closer. What dress are ye wearin'?" said the
old aunt in her cracked, weak voice.

"My blue calico."

"Is your cashmere holdin' its color?"

"Yes, aunt Miranda."

"Do you keep it in a dark closet hung on the wrong side, as I told ye?"

"Always."

"Has your mother made her jelly?"

"She hasn't said."

"She always had the knack o' writin' letters with nothin' in 'em.
What's Mark broke sence I've been sick?"

"Nothing at all, aunt Miranda."

"Why, what's the matter with him? Gittin' lazy, ain't he? How 's John
turnin' out?"

"He's going to be the best of us all."

"I hope you don't slight things in the kitchen because I ain't there.
Do you scald the coffee-pot and turn it upside down on the winder-sill?"

"Yes, aunt Miranda."

"It's always 'yes' with you, and 'yes' with Jane," groaned Miranda,
trying to move her stiffened body; "but all the time I lay here knowin'
there's things done the way I don't like 'em."

There was a long pause, during which Rebecca sat down by the bedside
and timidly touched her aunt's hand, her heart swelling with tender
pity at the gaunt face and closed eyes.

"I was dreadful ashamed to have you graduate in cheesecloth, Rebecca,
but I couldn't help it no-how. You'll hear the reason some time, and
know I tried to make it up to ye. I'm afraid you was a laughin'-stock!"

"No," Rebecca answered. "Ever so many people said our dresses were the
very prettiest; they looked like soft lace. You're not to be anxious
about anything. Here I am all grown up and graduated,--number three in
a class of twenty-two, aunt Miranda,--and good positions offered me
already. Look at me, big and strong and young, all ready to go into the
world and show what you and aunt Jane have done for me. If you want me
near, I'll take the Edgewood school, so that I can be here nights and
Sundays to help; and if you get better, then I'll go to Augusta,--for
that's a hundred dollars more, with music lessons and other things
beside."

"You listen to me," said Miranda quaveringly. "Take the best place,
regardless o' my sickness. I'd like to live long enough to know you'd
paid off that mortgage, but I guess I shan't."

Here she ceased abruptly, having talked more than she had for weeks;
and Rebecca stole out of the room, to cry by herself and wonder if old
age must be so grim, so hard, so unchastened and unsweetened, as it
slipped into the valley of the shadow.

The