GRACE TAKES A HAND.

"Mother, darling, may I have a good long talk with you to-day, a
confidential talk, we two by ourselves?"

"Yes, Grace, I shall be delighted."

"And when can it be? You always have so many around you, dear; and no
wonder, this is the centre of the house, this chair, which is your
throne."

"Well, let me see," said Mrs. Wainwright, considering. "After dinner the
children go to Sunday-school, and papa has always a few Sunday patients
whom he must visit. Between two and four I am always alone on Sunday and
we can have a chat then. Mildred and Frances will probably walk home
with Miriam and want to carry you off to the Manse to tea."

"Not on my first home Sunday, mamma," said Grace. "I must have every
littlest bit of that here, though I do expect to have good times with
the Manse girls. Is Mrs. Raeburn as sweet as ever? I remember her
standing at the station and waving me good-bye when I went away with
auntie, and Amy, the dearest wee fairy, was by her side."

"Amy is full of plans," said Mrs. Wainwright. "She is going to the
League to study art if her mother can spare her. Mildred and Frances
want to go on with their French, and one of the little boys, I forget
which, has musical talent; but there is no one in Highland who can teach
the piano. The Raeburn children are all clever and bright."

"They could hardly help being that, mamma, with such a father and
mother, and the atmosphere of such a home."

All this time there was the hurry and bustle of Sunday morning in a
large family where every one goes to church, and the time between
breakfast and half-past ten is a scramble. Grace kept quietly on with
the work she had that morning assumed, straightening the quilts on the
invalid's chair, bringing her a new book, and setting a little vase with
a few late flowers on the table by her side. Out of Grace's trunks there
had been produced gifts for the whole household, and many pretty things,
pictures and curios, which lent attractiveness to the parlor, grown
shabby and faded with use and poverty, but still a pretty and homelike
parlor, as a room which is lived in by well-bred people must always be.

"Well, when the rest have gone to Sunday-school, and papa has started on
his afternoon rounds, I'll come here and take my seat, where I used to
when I was a wee tot, and we'll have an old-fashioned confab. Now, if
the girls have finished dressing, I'll run and get ready for church. I'm
so glad all