ed young matron, so of course we have
no youthful experiences in common to hark back to together. That is the
very back-bone of a family reunion in my opinion. Now that year in
Arizona, when you all took me in as one of yourselves, is about all that
I can remember of real home-life, and somehow, when I think of home, it
is the Wigwam that I see, and the good cheer and the jolly times that I
always found there."

Joyce looked up again, touched and pleased. "I'm so glad that you feel
that way, for we always count you in, right after Jack and the little
boys. Mamma always speaks of you as 'my other' boy, and as for Mary, she
quotes you on all occasions, and thinks you are very near perfection.
She is going to be so delighted when she sees you, that I'd not be a bit
surprised if she should jump up and down and squeal, right in the
station."

The mention of this old habit of Mary's brought up to each of them the
mental picture of the child, as she had looked on various occasions when
her unbounded pleasure was forced to find expression in that way. In
the year that Joyce had been away from her she had been in her thoughts
oftener as that quaint little creature of eight, than the sixteen-year
old school girl she had grown into.

Phil, too, accustomed to thinking of Mary as he had known her at the
Wigwam, could hardly believe he saw aright, when the train pulled in and
she flew down the steps to throw her arms around Joyce. It was the same,
lovable, eager little face that looked up into his, the same impetuous
unspoiled child, yet a second glance left him puzzled. There was some
intangible change he could not label, and it interested him to try to
analyze it.

She was taller, of course, almost as tall as Joyce, with skirts almost
as long, but it was not that which impressed him with the sense of
change. It was a certain girlish winsomeness, something elusive, which
cannot be defined, but which lends a charm like nothing else in all the
world to the sweet unfolding of early maidenhood.

If Phil had been asked to describe the girl that Mary would grow into,
he never would have pictured this development. He expected her desert
experiences to give her a strong forceful character. She would be like
the pioneer women of early times, he imagined; rugged and energetic and
full of resources. But he had not expected this gentleness of manner,
this unconscious dignity and a certain poise that reminded him of--he
was puzzled to thin