e.

"All right, Uncle Henry, I promise. If Father and Mother want me to go I
will, and I'll try not to let them see how hard it is. After all, it
won't be like going to stay with strangers, for I shall be with my own
relations all the time, and it will be so nice to have a cousin of my
own age. Here comes the wagon, so we can't talk any more now. Oh, Uncle
Henry, there's just one question I want to ask. Are there many good
surgeons in New York?"

"Plenty of them," said her uncle, smiling. "Don't say anything of what
we have been talking about, Marjorie, until I have a chance to explain
to your mother."

"No, I won't, and, Uncle Henry, please don't think me ungrateful because
I couldn't be so glad just at first. It's beautiful of you and Aunt
Julia to want me, and if I go I'll try not to give any more trouble
than I can possibly help. Now I am going to my room for a few minutes. I
don't want Aunt Jessie to see me till I've got my face straightened out.
She knows me so well she says she can tell the moment there is anything
the matter."

CHAPTER VI

THE LAST EVENING

IT was settled. Marjorie was to go East with her uncle, and spend the
winter in New York. Mr. Carleton felt that he could not leave his
business much longer, and was anxious to start as soon as Marjorie could
be ready. For a week Mrs. Graham and Miss Jessie had sewed as they had
never sewed before, and Marjorie and even Undine had worked so hard that
there had been little time to think of anything else. Now it was the
last evening, and the small leather trunk containing all Marjorie's
simple possessions, stood packed, and ready to be taken early next
morning, to the railway station twenty miles away.

Mr. Carleton had been somewhat puzzled by all these elaborate
preparations, and had ventured a gentle remonstrance to his sister.

"Why take so much trouble, Susie? Julia will get the child everything
she needs, and I'll attend to the bills. You needn't worry about
Marjorie's being well-dressed; you know Julia has excellent taste."

But Mrs. Graham was resolute. She knew well that her own ideas of dress
and those of her New York sister-in-law were very different, but she was
not without her share of family pride, and was not willing that Marjorie
should appear before her Eastern relatives in clothes unfit for her
position. But alas! It was twelve years since Mrs. Graham had left her
New York home, and styles change a good deal in twelve years.