great throb of something between joy and pain as
she saw the words, 'My dear child,' and then went on to read the note so
characteristic of him.

'What a strange fancy of his to go off so suddenly to California. I
wonder Mr. Frank allowed it,' she said, as she put the note in her
pocket, and then, at a call from Mrs. Crawford, went down to where the
supper was waiting for her.

The tea cakes were a little cold, but everything else was delicious,
from the fragrant tea to the ripe berries and thick, sweet cream, and
Jerrie enjoyed it all with the keen relish of youth and perfect health.

After supper was over Jerrie made her grandmother sit still while she
washed up and put away the dishes, singing as she worked, and whistling,
too--loud, dear, ringing strains, which made a robin in the grass fly up
to the perch, where, with his head turned on one side he listened, as
if in wonder, to this new songster, whose notes were strange to him.

And Jerrie did seem like some joyous bird just let loose from prison, as
she flitted from one thing to another, now setting her grandmother's cap
a little more squarely on her head, and bending to kiss the silvery hair
as she said to her, 'Your working days are over now, for I have come
home to care for you, and in the future you have nothing to do but to
sit still, with your dear old lame feet on a cushion;' now helping
Harold water the flowers in the borders, and pinning a June pink in his
buttonhole, while he longed to take her in his arms and kiss her as in
the days when they were children together; now, going with him to milk
Nannie, who, either remembering Jerrie, or recognizing a friend in her,
allowed her gentle face to be petted and her horn to be decorated with a
knot of blue ribbon, which Jerrie took from her throat, and which Harold
afterward took from Nannie's horn and hid away with the withered lillies
Jerrie had thrown him that day at Harvard when her face and her eyes had
been his inspiration.

They kept early hours at the cottage, and the people at the Park House
were little more than through the grand dinner they were giving, when
Jerrie said good-night to her grandmother and Harold, and went up to her
new room under the raised roof. It was a lovely summer night, and the
moonlight fell softly upon the grass and shrubs outside, and shone far
down the long lane where the Tramp House stood, with its thick covering
of woodbine.

Leaning from the window Jerrie looked ou