nce. Lydia alone, walking
between them, was actuated by cool motives of duty and convention and
sighed as she thought of the heat and hubbub of the Hawkes's house, and
the hour that must elapse before they were back in the cool night again.

The Hawkeses had always lived in one house in Monroe. It was a large,
square, cheap house near the bridge, with a bare yard kept shabby by
picking chickens, and a fence of struggling pickets. Behind the house,
which had not been painted in the memory of man, was a yawning barn
which had never been painted at all. In the yard were various odds and
ends of broken machinery and old harness; a wagon-seat, on which
Grandma sometimes sat shelling beans or peeling potatoes in the summer
afternoons; old brooms, old saucepans, and lengths of rope, clotted
with mud. Fuchsia and rose-bushes languished in a tipsy wire enclosure
near the front door.

To-night, although the yard presented a rather dismal appearance in the
early winter dark, the house was bursting with hospitality and good
cheer. From every one of the bare high windows raw gushes of light
tunnelled the gloom outside, and although the cold outside had frosted
all the glass, dim forms could be seen moving about, and voices and
laughter could be heard.

Martie briskly twisted the little rotary bell-handle that was set in
the centre of the front door, and before its harsh noise had died away,
the door was flung open and the Monroe sisters were instantly made a
part of the celebration. Hilarious members of the family and their even
more hilarious friends welcomed them in; the bare hallway was swarming
with young persons of both sexes; girls were coming down the stairs,
girls going up, and the complementary boys lined the wall, or,
grinning, looked on from the doorways.

The front room on the left, usually a bedroom, was used for a smoking
room to-night; the dining-room door had been locked, but on the right
two doors gave entrance to the long parlours, and here were older men,
older women--Mrs. Hawkes, big, energetic, perspiring all over her
delighted face; Carrie David, wild with hospitable excitement; and Joe
Hawkes, Senior, a lean little eager Irishman, quite in his glory
to-night. Throned on a sort of dais, in the front bay window, was
Grandma Kelly, a little shrivelled beaming old woman, in a crumpled,
shining, black satin gown. Her hair was scanty, showing a wide bald
parting, and to hear in all the confusion she was obliged