er needle, "don't ever, ever make the mistake of letting one of
the creatures know just what is coming to him. Isn't that right, Nell?"

"Yes, and it is pretty hard to keep them in a state of uncertainty
about you when there are four certain children between you, but I go
over to visit my mother at Hillsboro as often as she'll have the caravan
and plead with Billy Harvey or Hampton Dibrell to keep me out until I'm
late for dinner every time they pick me up for a little charitable spin.
That and other deceptions have kept Mark Morgan uncertainly happy so
far, but if I am pushed to the wall I'll--I'll go to the Reverend Mr.
Goodloe's study for ministerial counsel like you did last Friday
afternoon, Harriet," was Nell's contribution to the discussion, which
she delivered over the head of the Suckling on her breast.

"Now how did you get hold of that choice bit of scandal, Nellie?" asked
Harriet, with serene interest as she bit off a tag of purple silk thread
from the stem of one of her violets.

"Billy Harvey says that scandal is a yellow pup that dogs a parson's
heels, to which everybody throws some kind of bone," remarked Jessie.
Jessie always vigorously represses Billy in his own presence and then
quotes him eternally when he is absent.

"Mother Spurlock had come over from the Settlement to see him about the
state of the treasury of the Mothers' Aid Class, and she stopped in to
get a bundle of clothes I had for her," Nell answered Harriet's
question. "She said she didn't mind the hour lost if the parson could
give a 'wee bit of comfort' to your 'wrestling' soul. I didn't like to
tell her that I thought it might be Mr. Goodloe who was wrestling--for
life and liberty--for you and I have been friends since we could toddle,
Harriet, but it was temptation to share my anxiety with her." And
serenely Nellie patted the back of the drowsing Suckling.

"Wrong this time, Nell," answered Harriet, as she placed still another
violet. "I was doing the wrestling, but I went to the mat. I gave up
twenty-five dollars and took the directorship of that Mothers' Aid.
Never having been a mother, I pointed out to him that I was not exactly
qualified, but he laid stress upon my energy and business acumen and I
gave up. I mentioned you for the honor, but those marvelous eyes of his
glowed with some sort of inner warmth and he said that you had all you
could do and would need help from me just as the women at the Settlement
do. I'm going to