ld
crested tapestry across the press to hide her books and needlework
inside. They usually sat there together, Marcella reading or dreaming,
Aunt Janet sewing or sitting listless, not even dreaming. But into
Marcella's dreams had come frequent movements of her aunt's hand going
in behind the curtain. Several times when she had spoken to her, Aunt
Janet had waited a few seconds before answering, and then had spoken in
a queerly muffled voice. One day, looking in the cupboard for needle and
cotton, Marcella had seen a big paper bag full of sweets--a thing she
had not seen at the farm since her mother died. They were acid drops;
she took one or two and meant to ask her aunt for some in the evening
when they sat together. But she forgot until, falling into one of her
dreams and staring in the fire, she noticed her aunt take something
almost slyly from the cupboard and put in her mouth behind the cover of
her book, glancing at her furtively as she did so. The amazing fact that
she was eating the acid drops secretly came into her mind and she sat
trying to reason it out for some minutes.

"Mean thing--she doesn't want me to have any," was her first thought
which she dismissed a moment later as she remembered certain very
distinct occasions when her aunt had been anything but mean, times when
she had deliberately stayed away from a scanty meal that the others
should have more--little sacrifices that Marcella was only just
beginning to understand.

"I don't believe she's mean--anyway, I _know_ she isn't. I believe she
doesn't have half enough to eat and these sweets make up for it! Or
else--she likes sweets frightfully and doesn't want me to know she's
so--so kiddish."

Quick tears had sprung into Marcella's eyes, tears of pity and of
impotence as she wondered what on earth she could do for Aunt Janet.
After a while, when she was quite sure the acid drop was swallowed, and
no other had taken its place, she knelt down on the hearth and, after a
minute, shyly drew herself over to her aunt's side.

"Aunt Janet," she said, taking one of the thin blue-veined hands in
hers, "Auntie--"

"What is it, Marcella?"

"I--I don't know. Oh, Aunt Janet, I do wish there was something I could
do for you."

"Marcella!" cried her aunt, almost shocked.

"Oh dear, you make me cry, Aunt Janet, to see you sitting here so lonely
and so still. You seem like father--there's a wall all round you that I
can't get inside. Oh and I do love you! I'