et in their gay slippers, "But I
had my legs _then_."

"You have your smile now. A happy heart is worth more than a dozen pair
of legs, dear. It was your merry voice, your gay laughter, your joyous
nature that cheered your Lilac Lady. Surely you didn't lose all those
when you lost the use of your feet!"

Peace smiled ruefully. "You'd have thought so if you had lived with me
since I got hurt," she confessed.

"I don't believe it," Aunt Pen vigorously contradicted. "Our real Peace,
our little sunbeam has just been hiding under a dark cloud all this
while. She is coming back to us her own gay self some day,--soon, we
hope."

"Do you b'lieve that?" Peace eagerly demanded.

"I know it," the woman answered with conviction.

"But s'posing I have really forgotten how to laugh and--and whistle, and
be nice?"

"Pshaw! As if you could have forgotten all that, dear! But even then, it
is never too late to learn, you know."

"That's so. And maybe after a bit it would be easier. I--guess
I'll--try to learn--again, Aunt Pen. May I keep this little poem so's I
won't forget any more? It's really mine, for she wrote it for me, didn't
she?"

"Yes, indeed, darling. That's your message. You helped your Lilac Lady,
and now she is going to help you."

CHAPTER VI

THE PARSONAGE TWINS

"Peace, Peace, guess what's happened!"

Allee tore across the smooth, green lawn as if racing for her life; and
Cherry, following hard upon her heels, panted protestingly, "I'm going
to tell her. It's my right. I heard what he said first."

"I don't care if you did," retorted Allee. "I reached her chair first.
So now!"

It was just a week since Aunt Pen's visit to the President's house, but
already a remarkable change had come over the little invalid in her
wheel-chair prison. The dull indifference had disappeared from the thin
face, the hopeless look from the somber eyes; and though there was still
a sadly pathetic droop to the once merry mouth, she seemed to have
shaken off the deadly apathy which had gripped her for so long, and to
have taken a fresh hold upon life again. True, it was hard work to smile
and look happy with the dreadful knowledge tugging at one's heart that
one must be a helpless cripple for the rest of her days, but the first
smile had made it easier for the second to come, and gradually the old
merry disposition came creeping back. Aunt Pen was right,--her real self
had only been in hiding, and with the lifting of