ould be justified by further acquaintance.

"Don't be anxious," he said. "All this hurry of preparation has been a
severe test on her, taken with her reluctance to leave her home. She is
feeling stronger now, and it will be better for her to get the
leave-taking over than to postpone and dread it longer. You will all
make it easy for her--No breakdowns," he cautioned, with a smile. "New
Mexico is a great place, and you are doing the best thing in the world
in getting her off before cold weather."

He was gone, but they felt as if a reviving breeze had passed over them,
and when they went back to their mother's room it was with serene faces.
If Charlotte swallowed hard at a lump in her throat, and Celia lingered
an instant behind the rest to pinch the colour back into her cheeks,
nobody observed it. Perhaps each was too occupied with acting his own
light-hearted part. Somehow the minutes slipped away, and soon the
travellers were at the door.

Into Mrs. Birch's face, also, the colour had returned, summoned there,
it may be, not only by the doctor's stimulating draught, but by the
insistence of her own will.

"Good-by! good-by! God be with you all!" murmured Mr. Birch, breaking
with difficulty away from Justin's frantic hug.

Mrs. Birch, on Lansing's arm, had gone down the steps to the carriage.
The father followed, surrounded by an eager group. Only Lansing was to
go to the train. The others, as they crowded round the carriage door,
were incoherently mingling parting messages. Then presently they were
left behind, a suddenly quiet, sober group.

Inside the carriage Mrs. Birch, with her hand in her eldest son's, was
saying to him things he never forgot, while his father looked steadily
out of the window.

"I leave them in your care, dear," she told Lansing, in the quiet,
confident tones to which he was used from her. "I could never go, I
think, if I hadn't such a strong, brave, trustworthy son to leave in
care of the younger ones. Celia will do her part, and do it beautifully,
I know, but it's on you I rely."

"I'll do my best," he answered, cheerfully, although he felt, even more
than before, the heavy responsibility upon him.

"I know you will. Don't let Celia overdo. She will be so ambitious to
run the household economically that she will set herself tasks she's not
fit for. See that Jeff keeps steadily at his studies, and be lenient
with Justin. He adores you--you can make the year do much for him if you
ta