Charlotte was offering
her thanks to three warm gentlemen, and regretting that she had not been
keeping house long enough to have any refreshment to offer them.

"Come over when we are settled, and Granny and I will have some sparkling
Southern beverages for you," she promised.

"You are coming over to sleep, child," Ellen said, as the time for
departure arrived, and Charlotte showed signs of closing up her small
domain.

"Not at all. I mean to have the fun of spending my first night in my new
home," Miss Ruston declared, and held to her decision, in spite of the
arguments and entreaties of the women and the assertions of the men that
she would be afraid.

"Well, then, beat on a dishpan if anything disturbs you, and we'll rush
across in a body and rescue you," promised Macauley.

Left alone, Charlotte went inside, lighted a genial looking lamp, and sat
down alone in her little living-room. Chin in her palms, she leaned her
elbows upon the spindle-legged table, looking up at the portrait of her
mother, its fine colourings glowing in the mellow light from the lamp.
She sat for a long time in this posture, her eyes losing their sparkle
and growing dreamy, and--at last--a trifle misty. When this stage
occurred she suddenly jumped up, carried the lamp into the kitchen,
searched until she found a candle and lighted it, then, extinguishing
the lamp, she went slowly upstairs to the cot bed.

By the following evening her preparations were so far complete that she
could take the evening train for Baltimore, announcing that the two
future occupants of the little house would return within forty-eight
hours. During her absence the three women who were her friends put their
heads together, ordered extra baking and brewing done in their own
kitchens, and ended by stocking her small shelves with a great array
of good things.

Before the forty-eight hours had quite gone by Miss Ruston was leading a
tiny figure, with shoulders held almost as straight as her own, in at the
hedge gate. It was twilight of the August evening. The cottage door was
open and the rays from the lamp lately lighted by her neighbours streamed
down the path.

Charlotte stooped--she had to stoop a long way--and put her lips close to
the small ear under the white hair which lay softly over it. "Doesn't it
look like home, Granny?" she said, in a peculiar, clear tone, a little
raised.

"What say, dear?" responded a low and quite toneless voice--the voice of