dear me! where is that class-book of mine? He wants those names, I dare
say, and I haven't them ready. I might have been copying them while I
was mooning my time away here."

The first words she said to him as she went down to the stuffy
boarding-house parlor were, "I haven't them ready, Dr. Dennis; I'm real
sorry, and it's my fault, too. I had time to copy them, and I just
didn't do it."

"I haven't come for them," he said smiling and holding out his hand!
"How do you do?"

"Oh, quite well. Didn't you come for them? I am glad, for I felt
ashamed. Dr. Dennis, don't you see how well one woman can do the work of
twenty? Don't you like the way the primary class is managed? Oh, by the
way, you want that book, don't you? I meant to send it home by Gracie."

"I don't want it," he said, laughing this time. "Are you resolved that I
may not call on you without a good and tangible reason? If that be the
case, I certainly have one. I want you to sit down here, while I tell
you all about it."

"I'm not in the mood for a scolding," she said, trying to speak gayly,
though there was a curious little tremble to her voice. "I have been
away down in the valley of gloom to-day. I believe I am a little
demoralized. Dr. Dennis, I think I need a prayer-meeting every evening;
I could be happier then, I know."

"A Christian ought to be able to have one," he said, quickly. "Two souls
ought to be able to come together in communion with the Master every
evening. There is a great deal of wasted happiness in this world. I want
to talk to you about that very thing."

Dr. Dennis was not given to making long calls on his parishioners; there
were too many of them, and he had too little time; but he made an
unprecedentedly long one on Marion Wilbur.

When she went back to her room that night, the fire was gone out
utterly; not even a smoke remained. She lighted her smoky little
lamp--there was no gas in the third story--and looked at her watch with
an amazed air; she had not imagined that it could be nearly 11 o'clock!
Then she pushed the reports into a drawer and turned the key; no use to
attempt reports for that evening. As she picked up her class-book, the
scribbling on the fly-leaf caught her eye again. She smiled a rare,
rich, happy smile; then swiftly she drew her pencil and added one more
name to the line. "Marion Wilbur--Marion J. Wilbur," it read. There was
just room on the line for another word; then it read--"Marion J. Wilbur
Dennis