t all these years--packed it with my
very oldest duds, and--well, here I am!" and the old lady's laugh rang
out as shrill and clear as a blackbird's call.

"I have astonished you; have I?" she pursued. "And I suppose I have
astonished my folks. But they know I'm perfectly capable of taking care
of myself. I ought to be. Why, I'm a grandmother three times!"

"'Three times?'" repeated the amazed 'Phemie.

"Yes, Miss Euphemia Bray. Three grandchildren--two girls and a boy. And
they are always telling folks how up-to-date grandma is! I'm sick of being
up-to-date. I'm sick of dressing so that folks behind me on the street
can't tell whether I'm a grandmother or my own youngest grandchild!

"We just live in a perfect whirl of excitement. 'Pleasure,' they call
it. But it's gotten to be a nuisance. My daughter-in-law has her head
full of society matters and club work. The girls and Tom spend all but the
little time they are obliged to give to books in the private schools they
attend, in dancing and theatre parties, and the like.

"And here a week ago I found my son--their father--a man forty-five years
old, and bald, and getting fat, being taught the tango by a French dancing
professor in the back drawing-room!" exclaimed Mrs. Castle, in a tone of
disgust that almost convulsed 'Phemie.

"That was enough. That was the last straw on the camel's back. I made up
my mind when I read your sister's advertisement that I would like to live
simply and with simple people again. I'd like really to _feel_ like a
grandmother, and _dress_ like one, and _be_ one.

"And if I like it up here at your place I shall stay through the summer.
No hunting-lodge in the Adirondacks for me this spring, or Newport, or
the Pier later, or anything of that kind. I'm going to sit on your porch
and knit socks. My mother did when _she_ was a grandmother. This is her
shawl, and mother and father took this old carpet-bag with them when they
went on their honeymoon.

"Mother enjoyed her old age. She spent it quietly, and it was _lovely_,"
declared Mrs. Castle, with a note in her voice that made 'Phemie sober
at once. "I am going to have quiet, and repose, and a simple life, too,
before I have to die.

"It's just killing me keeping up with the times. I don't want to keep
up with 'em. I want them to drift by me, and leave me stranded in some
pleasant, sunny place, where I only have to look on. And that's what I
am going to get at Hillcrest--just that kind of