"You'll do nothing of the sort, John. Going away every Sunday
to two outside appointments and leaving our own people exposed
to Presbyterian doctrine. That's a horrid, bare, desolate little
school, anyway, and you couldn't do a bit of good to those people; I
know you couldn't. I'll go to the Trustee Board meeting--they meet
to-night--and I'll tell them you are physically unfit--you are
wearing two thicknesses of flannel, with mustard quilted in between
them, now on your chest, and you had onion poultices on your feet
last night for your cough, and so you're not fit to go."

"Please, ma'am," said Pearl, "we won't mind. I didn't notice it at
all, and I don't believe anybody will, if you don't tell them."

Mr. Burrell laughed so heartily that Mrs. Burrell told him he was a
very frivolous man, and quite unfit for the position he held.

"Sure, you could come out yerself," Pearl said encouragingly, "and
show us how to fix it up. It is bare, as you said, but the land is
there, and it could grow scarlet-runners and pansies, the same as you
have yer self here by the cheek of the dure. If some one like
yerself'd come and show us how to fix it up, we might have a purty
place yet!"

"Fix it up on Sunday!" Mrs. Burrell cried, with vehement emphasis.

"Show us, I said," Pearl corrected her, "and I guess it would be a
real good work to fix it up, too."

"It is lawful to do well on the Sabbath day, you know, Mattie," Mr.
Burrell quoted gently.

Mrs. Burrell sniffed audibly.

"The trustees meet this evening, Pearl. Now, if you will stay in,
I'll drive you out to-morrow morning. Mrs. Burrell will be glad to
have you stay here."

Mrs. Burrell seconded the invitation.

"But I am going to the meeting, John," she declared decidedly. "I'll
tell them that you are not to undertake it."

"My dear, I understood the Ladies' Aid were meeting to-night," her
husband said, with the forced enthusiasm of a person who tries to
draw a child's attention from a prohibited pleasure.

"It does, too; but I am going to the other meeting," answered his
amiable spouse.

Mr. Burrell looked at Pearl in alarm.

"But I want you to stay, Pearl," Mrs. Burrell said quickly, and with
more kindliness than she had yet shown.

Pearl thanked her, but said she would have to go to see her father
first and see if she could stay. Mrs. Burrell went out into the
kitchen to get tea ready, while Mr. Burrell went to the door with
Pearl.

In the little square ha