it so touching that she felt for
her handkerchief; but Tom took it away, and made her laugh instead of
cry, by saying, in a wheedlesome tone, "I don't believe you did as much,
for all your romance. Did you, now?"

"If you won't laugh, I 'll show you my treasures. I began first, and I
've worn them longest."

As she spoke, Polly drew out the old locket, opened it, and showed the
picture Tom gave her in the bag of peanuts cut small and fitted in on
one side on the other was a curl of reddish hair and a black button. How
Tom laughed when he saw them!

"You don't mean you 've kept that frightful guy of a boy all this time?
Polly! Polly! you are the most faithful 'loveress,' as Maud says, that
was ever known."

"Don't flatter yourself that I 've worn it all these years, sir; I only
put it in last spring because I did n't dare to ask for one of the new
ones. The button came off the old coat you insisted on wearing after the
failure, as if it was your duty to look as shabby as possible, and the
curl I stole from Maud. Are n't we silly?"

He did not seem to think so, and after a short pause for refreshments,
Polly turned serious, and said anxiously, "When must you go back to your
hard work?"

"In a week or two; but it won't seem drudgery now, for you 'll write
every day, and I shall feel that I 'm working to get a home for you.
That will give me a forty-man-power, and I 'll pay up my debts and get a
good start, and then Ned and I will be married and go into partnership,
and we 'll all be the happiest, busiest people in the West."

"It sounds delightful; but won't it take a long time, Tom?"

"Only a few years, and we need n't wait a minute after Syd is paid, if
you don't mind beginning rather low down, Polly."

"I 'd rather work up with you, than sit idle while you toil away all
alone. That 's the way father and mother did, and I think they were very
happy in spite of the poverty and hard work."

"Then we 'll do it by another year, for I must get more salary before I
take you away from a good home here. I wish, oh, Polly, how I wish I had
a half of the money I 've wasted, to make you comfortable, now."

"Never mind, I don't want it; I 'd rather have less, and know you earned
it all yourself," cried Polly, as Tom struck his hand on his knee with
an acute pang of regret at the power he had lost.

"It 's like you to say it, and I won't waste any words bewailing myself,
because I was a fool. We will work up together, m