, an old jet bar-brooch whose pin was gone, and various other
small odds and ends. She had but one pair of gloves, of black shiny
kid, somewhat whitened at the finger-tips, and worn only to church or
to funerals. They were a sort of institution, "my gloves," and were
kept in the bureau drawer. They distinguished her state from that of
Belle, the maid, who had no gloves at all.

Opposite the bureau, but because of the enormous size of the room, some
twenty-five feet away, was the "chestard" the high "chest of drawers"
that had won its name from the children's contracted pronunciation.
This bleak article of furniture contained the smaller pieces of Malcolm
Monroe's wardrobe, which matched in plainness and ugliness that of his
wife. Stiff white collars caught and rasped when the shallow upper
drawer was opened; the middle drawers were filled with brownish gray
flannels, and shirts stiff-bosomed and limp of sleeves. But if a
curious Martie, making the bed, or putting away the "wash," ever
cautiously tugged out the lowest drawer, she found it so loaded with
papers, old account books, and bundles of letters as to awe her young
soul. These meant nothing to Martie, and the drawer was heavy to open
noiselessly and awkward to close in haste, yet at intervals now and
then she liked to peep at its mysterious contents.

To-night, however, Martie gave it neither glance nor thought. She
picked up her father's slippers and ran downstairs again, going to
kneel before him and put them on his feet. As she did so her young warm
hand felt the cool, slender length of his foot in the thin stocking,
and she was conscious of repugnance that even the slightest contact
with her father always caused her. There was a definite antagonism
between Malcolm and his youngest daughter, suspected by neither. But
Martie knew that she did not like the faint odour of his moustache, his
breath, and his skin, on those rather infrequent occasions when he
kissed her, and her father was well aware that in baffling him, evading
him, and anticipating him, Martie was more annoying than the three
other children combined.

"Where's your son?" asked the man of the house, as the dinner,
accompanied by his wife, came in from the kitchen.

"I don't know, Pa," Mrs. Monroe said earnestly yet soothingly. "Come,
girls. Come, Pa!"

Malcolm rose stiffly, and went to his place.

"He comes and goes as if his father's house was a hotel, does he?" he
asked, as one merely curi