e ever and ever so long ago? Somewhere he had
"Thanked God and taken courage?" Yes. Rome _was_ real. Had her father
ever seen it? She would like to see it some day. And if she could ever
get to where she could teach school--Mr. Warfield had earned enough to
go abroad, and she remembered hearing him say he had worked all one year
with a farmer for the sake of eight months' schooling.

There was a gentle sound of hard regular breathing, not to be called a
snore, but a sign of sleep. Helen went on with a dream. Why couldn't she
stay somewhere in North Hope and work for her board nights and mornings
and go to the High School? She was learning so many things now about
history and literature, and the whole world it seemed. Occasionally she
looked over the list of examination studies and caught here and there a
fact she had not understood a few weeks ago. Why this was as good as a
school.

She would not breathe her plans to a soul. If only Mrs. Dayton might, or
could keep her! But early in October Mrs. Dayton shut up her house and
went on a round of visits after her summer's work, and Joanna went to
her sister's who had seven children, the eldest hardly fourteen. But
some place might open. If boys could work their way up, why not a girl?

There was a succession of pleasant days with a bright reviving westerly
wind. Driving was a delight. Sometimes they went out an hour or two
after breakfast, and oh, how glorious the world looked.

For two days Helen felt she was a coward. She ought to go home, but she
dreaded it somehow. Why wasn't Aunt Jane like--well, Mrs. Dayton for
instance, glad that other people should have some enjoyment? Yes, she
did enjoy Jenny's pleasure, but how often she threatened the others!

"Could we drive around by the Center this afternoon?" Helen asked a
little hesitatingly.

"Why--I thought we would go to Chestnut Hill. I like those long faded
yellow chestnut blooms that hang where there are to be no chestnuts. It
is like old age hanging on to some forlorn hope."

"But you do not like old age," Helen said, with a bright smile.

"Not for myself. Not for people in general. But it is pretty among the
clusters of green chestnut leaves. Mrs. Dayton could make a little
sermon out of that--useless old age."

"We might come round that way on our return," ventured the girl.

"Are you homesick?"

"Oh, no." A bright flush overspread Helen's face, and the light in her
eyes as she turned them on Mrs. Van Do