t she was very decided.
Don't you remember when she broke the cut glass fruit dish, because she
could not have any more pineapple?"

"Barbara!" Mrs. Dr. Van Buren exclaimed, her voice indicating her
surprise that her sister should so far forget herself as to reveal any
secrets of the family, and especially any which could be brought to bear
upon Ethelyn.

Aunt Barbara felt the implied rebuke, and while her sweet, old face
crimsoned with mortification, she said: "Truth is truth, Sophia. Ethie
is as dear to me as to you, but she was high-tempered, and did break the
big fruit bowl, and then denied herself sweetmeats of all kinds, and
even went without sugar in her coffee and butter on her bread until she
had saved enough to buy another in its place. Ethie was generous and
noble after it was all over, if she was a little hot at times. That's
what I was going to say when you stopped me so sudden."

Aunt Barbara looked a little aggrieved at being caught up so quickly by
her sister, who continued: "She was a Bigelow, and everybody knows what
kind of blood that is. She was too sensitive, and had too nice a
perception of what was proper to be thrown among"--heathen, she was
going to add, but something in Aunt Barbara's blue eyes kept her in
check, and so she abruptly turned to Richard and asked, "Did she leave
no message, no reason why she went?"

Richard could have boasted his Markham blood had he chosen, and the
white heats to which that was capable of being roused; but he was too
utterly broken to feel more than a passing flash of resentment for
anything which had yet been said, and after a moment's thought, during
which he was considering the propriety of showing Mrs. Van Buren what
Ethie had written of Frank, he held the letter to her, saying, "She left
this. Read it if you like. It's a part of my punishment, I suppose, that
her friends should know all."

With a stately bow Mrs. Van Buren took the letter and hastily read it
through, her lip quivering a little and her eyelids growing moist as
Ethie described the dreariness of that dreadful day when "Aunt Van Buren
came up from Boston and broke her heart." And as she read how much poor
Ethie had loved Frank, the cold, proud woman would have given all she
had if the past could be undone and Ethie restored to her just as she
was that summer nine years ago, when she came from the huckleberry hills
and stood beneath the maples. With a strange obtuseness peculiar to some
peo