my bank, you know. First he was
teller, then assistant cashier, and now for five years he has been
cashier. The president wants to resign and let him be president, but he
hardly has enough stock for that. But Oliver says" (Oliver was Miss
Hopkins' brother) "that there isn't a shrewder or straighter banker in
the state. Oliver likes him. He says he is a sandy little fellow."

"Well, he is," assented Mrs. Ellis. "It isn't many cashiers would let
robbers stab them and shoot them and leave them for dead rather than
give up the combination of the safe!"

"He wouldn't take a cent for it, either, and he saved ever so many
thousand dollars. Yes, he _is_ brave. I went to the same school with him
once, and saw him fight a big boy twice his size--such a nasty boy, who
called me 'Fatty,' and made a kissing noise with his lips just to scare
me--and poor little Cyril Winslow got awfully beaten, and when I saw him
on the ground, with his nose bleeding and that big brute pounding him, I
ran to the water-bucket, and poured the whole bucket on that big
bullying boy and stopped the fight, just as the teacher got on the
scene. I cried over little Cyril Winslow. He was crying himself. 'I
ain't crying because he hurt me,' he sobbed; 'I'm crying because I'm so
mad I didn't lick him!' I wonder if he remembers that episode?"

"Perhaps," said Mrs. Ellis.

"Maggie, what makes you think he is falling in love with Sibyl?"

Mrs. Ellis laughed. "I dare say he _isn't_ in love with Sibyl," said
she. "I think the main reason was his always riding by here instead of
taking the shorter road down the other street."

"Does he always ride by here? I hadn't noticed."

"Always!" said Mrs. Ellis. "_I_ had noticed."

"I am sorry for him," said Lorania, musingly. "I think Sibyl is very
much taken with that young Captain Carr at the Arsenal. Young girls
always affect the army. He is a nice fellow, but I don't think he is the
man Winslow is. Now, Maggie, advise me about the suit. I don't want to
look like the escaped fat lady of a museum."

Lorania thought no more of Sibyl's love affairs. If she thought of the
Winslows, it was to wish that Mrs. Winslow would sell or rent her
pasture, which, in addition to her own and Mrs. Ellis' pastures thrown
into one, would make such a delightful bicycle track.

The Winslow house was very different from the two villas that were the
pride of Fairport. A little story and a half cottage peeped out on the
road behind the