and
overworked; and then Tom Tracy was always making fun of the addition,
and saying it made the cottage look like a pig-sty with a steeple to
it, and that you would think so too; and if it were his he'd tear the
old hut down and start anew. Peterkin, too, made remarks about its being
out of proportion to the rest of the house, and wondered where Harold
got the money, and why he didn't do this and that, but supposed he
couldn't afford it, adding that "beggars couldn't be choosers." When
Harold heard all that, he was tired, and nervous, and sick, and
discouraged, and his hands were blistered and bruised with hard work.
His head was aching, and he just put it on that table, where you are
sitting, and cried like a baby. When I tried to comfort him, he said,
"It isn't the hard work, grandmother; I don't mind that in the least;
neither do I care for what they say, or should not, if there was not
some truth in it; things are out of proportion, and the new room makes
the rest of the cottage look lower than ever, and I'd like so much to
have everything right for Jerrie, who would not shame the Queen's
palace. I wish, for her sake, that I had money, and could make her home
what it ought to be. I do not want her to feel homesick, or long for
something better, when she comes back to us."'

Jerrie was crying outright now; but Mrs. Crawford, who was a little deaf
and did not hear her, went on:

'If you were a hundred times his sister he could not love you more than
he does, or wish to make you happier. He would have gone for you last
night, only he was so tired, and I persuaded him to go to bed. I knew
somebody would come home with you, Dick, wasn't it? I thought I heard
his voice.'

'Yes, it was Dick,' Jerrie answered, very low, returning again to her
breakfast, while her grandmother rambled on:

'Harold slept so soundly that he never heard the storm or knew there was
one till this morning. Lucky you didn't start home till it was over.
You'd have been wet to the skin.'

Jerrie made no answer, for she could not tell of that interview under
the pines, or that she had been wet to the skin, and felt chilly even
now from the effects of it. It seemed that Mrs. Crawford would never
tire talking of Harold, for she continued:

'He was up this morning about daylight, I do believe, and had his own
breakfast eaten and that table laid for you when I came down. He wanted
to see you before he went, and know if you were pleased; but I told