not dispense with in their square bit of garden, and
squandered the money that should have provided for the wife and five
children whose wretchedness had torn Gerry's tender heart.

All day she thought and thought; and, as she washed the supper dishes,
she was still thinking:--

"Now, Gerry Brace, what are your worldly possessions, anyway? Clothes
enough to be a wee bit more than respectable, a house plenty big for
two, but certainly not stretchable to take in six more, a little piece
of garden, and a nice big piece of grass and trees, and a barn. A barn!"
she repeated, clasping her hands in the dish-water with a splash.

"Mother Brace," she said ten minutes later, when she sat on the top step
of the front porch with her arms across her mother's knee. "I believe
I've hit on the very thing to do. There are the Jimsons in their
tumble-down house, and here are we with a perfectly whole, clean barn
without even a cat in it. Don't you see the possibilities? Presto!
Change! There is the tumble-down house empty, and here are the Jimsons
living in the perfectly whole barn." Mother Brace gasped.

"But Gerry--"

"Oh, mother dear, please don't 'but.' You know there are two parts to
the barn down-stairs, and up-stairs there are three. They could have a
living-room, kitchen, and three bed-rooms."

[Illustration: "_I believe I've hit on the very thing to do_."]

"Yes'm," said Mother Brace meekly, "but where would they get the three
beds?"

"Why, I suppose they sleep on something now, though probably it wouldn't
fit our clean barn; that's a fact."

For a moment Gerry looked crestfallen. Then she brightened again.

"Well, I can think that out, too, seeing I thought of the barn. The
question is, mother, would you be willing to have them come!"

There was silence on the porch for a few minutes while Mother Brace
watched the sunset over beyond the hills.

"It looks like the gates of the celestial city," she said at last,
"where there are homes for everybody. Yes, Gerry, dear, I'd be willing
to have them come, if there's anyway of fixing it."

Gerry squeezed the work-roughened hand that had slipped into hers.

"You blessed! Of course, I knew you would. Mother, I'm going to Aunt
Serinda about the beds."

"Your Aunt Serinda?" Mother Brace gasped again. "Why, Gerry!"

"Yes'm," repeated Gerry. "I'm going to Aunt Serinda. There is no sense
in having a garret full of old furniture when there's an empty barn just
hungry for it