int! What
you want to do is to go long to your schoolin', if you reely are going
to make somepin of yourself at last, an' let that big strap of a girl
be, do--"

"Now, stop!" shouted George Holt. "Scenting another scandal, are you?
Don't you dare mar Kate Bates' standing, or her reputation in this
town, or we'll have a time like we never had before. If old Bates
doesn't give his girls anything when they marry, they'll get more when
he dies. And so far as money is concerned, this has gone PAST money
with me. I'm going to marry Kate Bates, as soon as ever I can, and
I've got to the place where I'd marry her if she hadn't a cent. If I
can't take care of her, she can take care of me. I am crazy about her,
an' I'm going to have her; so you keep still, an' do all you can to
help me, or you'll regret it."

"It's you that will regret it!" she said.

"Stop your nagging, I tell you, or I'll come at you in a way you won't
like," he cried.

"You do that every day you're here," said Mrs. Holt, starting to the
kitchen to begin dinner.

Kate appeared in half an hour, fresh and rosy, also prepared; for one
of her little pupils had said: "Tilly Nepple's sister say you wasn't
at your sister's wedding at all. Did you cry 'cause you couldn't go?"

Instantly Kate comprehended what must be town gossip, so she gave the
child a happy solution of the question bothering her, and went to her
boarding house forewarned. She greeted both Mrs. Holt and her son
cordially, then sat down to dinner, in the best of spirits. The
instant her chance came, Mrs. Holt said: "Now tell us all about the
lovely wedding."

"But I wasn't managing the wedding," said Kate cheerfully. "I was on
the infare job. Mother and Nancy Ellen put the wedding through. You
know our house isn't very large, and close relatives fill it to
bursting. I've seen the same kind of wedding about every eighteen
months all my life. I had a NEW job this time, and one I liked better."

She turned to George: "Of course your mother told you that Dr. Gray
came after me. He came to ask me as an especial favour to go to his
new house in Hartley, and do what I could to arrange it, and to have a
supper ready. I was glad. I'd seen six weddings that I can remember,
all exactly alike--there's nothing to them; but brushing those new
carpets, unwrapping nice furniture and placing it, washing pretty new
dishes, untying the loveliest gifts and arranging them--THAT was
something