out so loud, down in the parlour," she asked
her mother, "just before he came up. Is there any new trouble?"

"No; it was nothing."

"I couldn't tell. Once I thought you were laughing." She went about,
closing the curtains on account of her mother's headache, and doing
awkwardly and imperfectly the things that Irene would have done so
skilfully for her comfort.

The day wore away to nightfall, and then Mrs. Lapham said she MUST
know. Penelope said there was no one to ask; the clerks would all be
gone home, and her mother said yes, there was Mr. Corey; they could
send and ask him; he would know.

The girl hesitated. "Very well," she said, then, scarcely above a
whisper, and she presently laughed huskily. "Mr. Corey seems fated to
come in, somewhere. I guess it's a Providence, mother."

She sent off a note, inquiring whether he could tell her just where her
father had expected to be that night; and the answer came quickly back
that Corey did not know, but would look up the book-keeper and inquire.
This office brought him in person, an hour later, to tell Penelope that
the Colonel was to be at Lapham that night and next day.

"He came in from New York, in a great hurry, and rushed off as soon as
he could pack his bag," Penelope explained, "and we hadn't a chance to
ask him where he was to be to-night. And mother wasn't very well,
and----"

"I thought she wasn't looking well when she was at the office to-day.
And so I thought I would come rather than send," Corey explained in his
turn.

"Oh, thank you!"

"If there is anything I can do--telegraph Colonel Lapham, or anything?"

"Oh no, thank you; mother's better now. She merely wanted to be sure
where he was."

He did not offer to go, upon this conclusion of his business, but hoped
he was not keeping her from her mother. She thanked him once again,
and said no, that her mother was much better since she had had a cup of
tea; and then they looked at each other, and without any apparent
exchange of intelligence he remained, and at eleven o'clock he was
still there. He was honest in saying he did not know it was so late;
but he made no pretence of being sorry, and she took the blame to
herself.

"I oughtn't to have let you stay," she said. "But with father gone,
and all that trouble hanging over us----"

She was allowing him to hold her hand a moment at the door, to which
she had followed him.

"I'm so glad you could let me!" he said, "and I want to as