y partaking of the
evening meal at home. Moreover, Miss Skinner had an engagement with a
young man. Cynthia saw the fire, and threw off her sealskin coat which
Mr. and Mrs. Merrill had given her for Christmas, and took down the
saucepan from the familiar nail on which it hung. It was a miraculous
fact, for which she did not attempt to account, that she was almost
happy: happy, indeed, in comparison to that which had been her state
since the afternoon before. Millicent snatched the saucepan angrily from
her hand.

"What be you doin', Cynthy?" she demanded.

Such was Miss Skinner's little way of showing deference. Though
deference is not usually vehement, Miss Skinner's was very real,
nevertheless.

"Why, Milly, what's the matter?" exclaimed Cynthia, in astonishment.

"You hain't a-goin' to do any cookin', that's all," said Milly, very red
in the face.

"But I've always helped," said Cynthia. "Why not?"

Why not? A tribute was one thing, but to have to put the reasons for
that tribute, into words was quite another.

"Why not?" cried Milly, "because you hain't a-goin' to, that's all."

Strange deference! But Cynthia turned and looked at the girl with a
little, sad smile of comprehension and affection. She took her by the
shoulders and kissed her.

Whereupon a most amazing thing happened--Millicent burst into
tears--wild, ungovernable tears they were.

"Because you hain't a-goin' to," she repeated, her words interspersed
with violent sobs. "You go 'way, Cynthy," she cried, "git out!"

"Milly," said Cynthia, shaking her head, "you ought to be ashamed of
yourself." But they were not words of reproof. She took a little lamp
from the shelf, and went up the narrow stairs to her own room in the
gable, where Lemuel had deposited the rawhide trunk.

Though she had had nothing all day, she felt no hunger, but for Milly's
sake she tried hard to eat the supper when it came. Before it had fairly
begun Moses Hatch had arrived, with Amandy and Eben; and Rias Richardson
came in, and other neighbors, to say a word of welcome to hear (if the
truth be not too disparaging to their characters) the reasons for her
sudden appearance, and such news of her Boston experiences as she might
choose to give them. They had learned from Lem Hallowell that Cynthia
had returned a lady: a real lady, not a sham one who relied on airs and
graces, such as had come to Coniston the summer before to look for a
summer place on the painter's recommen