he wiped the perspiration from his face and wondered at the perversity
of the boy in selecting that spot of all others, where he must play and
sit and kick as only a healthy, active child can do.

But after the day when Grey succeeded in capturing his hands, Granpa
Jerrold ceased to interfere with the play-house, and the boy was left in
peace upon the bench, though his grandfather often sat near and watched
him anxiously, and always seemed relieved when the child tired of that
particular spot and wandered elsewhere in quest of amusement.

There was, however, one place in the house which Grey never sought to
penetrate, and that was his grandfather's bedroom. It is true he had
never been allowed to enter it, for one of Hannah's first lessons was
that her father did not like children in his room. Ordinarily this would
have made no difference with Grey, who had a way of going where he
pleased; but the gloomy appearance of the room where the curtains were
always down did not attract him, and he would only go as far as the door
and look in, saying to his aunt:

"Bears in there! Grey not go."

And Hannah let him believe in the bears, and breathed more freely when
he came away from the door, though she frequently whispered to herself.

"Some time Grey will know, for I must tell him, and he will help me."

This fancy that Grey was to lift the cloud which overshadowed her, was a
consolation to Hannah, and helped to make life endurable, when at last
his parents returned from Europe, and he went to his home in Boston.
After that Grey spent some portion of every summer at the farm-house
growing more and more fond of his Aunt Hannah, notwithstanding her quiet
manner and the severe plainness of her personal appearance so different
from his mother and his Aunt Lucy Grey. His Aunt Hannah always wore a
calico dress, or something equally as plain and inexpensive, and her
hands were rough and hard with toil, for she never had any one to help
her. She could not afford it, she said, and that was always her excuse
for the self-denials she practiced. And still Grey knew that she
sometimes had money, for he had seen his father give her gold in
exchange for bills, and he once asked her why she did not use it for her
comfort. There was a look of deep pain in her eyes, and her voice was
sadder than its wont, as she replied:

"I cannot touch that money. It is not mine; it would be stealing, to
take a penny of it."

Grey saw the question t