te
into the privet bush to nest.

Mother asked him to be seated, so he took one of the chairs nearest
him, and sat holding his hat in one hand, his whip in the other.
Mother drew a chair beside the dining table, dropped her hands on each
other, and looking in his eyes, she smiled at him. I tell the same
thing over about people's looks, but I haven't told of this smile of
mother's; because I never saw exactly how it was, or what it would do
to people, until that morning. Then as I watched her--for how she felt
decided what would happen to me, after Mr. Pryor was gone I saw
something I never had noticed until that minute. She could laugh all
over her face, before her lips parted until her teeth showed. She was
doing it now. With a wide smile running from cheek to cheek, pushing
up a big dimple at each end, her lips barely touching, her eyes
dancing, she sat looking at him.

"This IS the most blessed season for warming up the heart," she said.
"If you want the half of my kingdom, ask quickly. I'm in the mood to
bestow it."

How she laughed! He just had to loosen up a little, and smile back,
even though it looked pretty stiff.

"Well, I'll not tax you so far," he said. "I only want Mr. Stanton."

"But he is the whole of the kingdom, and the King to boot!" she
laughed, dimpled, and flamed redder.

Mr. Pryor stared at her wonderingly. You could even see the wonder,
like it was something you could take hold of. I suppose he wondered
what could make a woman so happy, like that.

"Lucky man!" he said. "All of us are not so fortunate."

"Then it must be you don't covet the place or the title," said mother
more soberly. "Any woman will crown the man she marries, if he will
allow her. Paul went farther. He compelled it."

"I wonder how!" said Mr. Pryor, his eyes steadily watching mother's
face.

"By never failing in a million little things, that taken as a whole,
make up one mighty big thing, on which he stands like the Rock of Ages."

"Yet they tell me that you are the mother of twelve children," he said,
as if he marvelled at something.

"Yes!" cried mother, and the word broke right through a bubbling laugh.
"Am I not fortunate above most women? We had the grief to lose two
little daughters at the ages of eight and nine, all the others I have,
and I rejoice in them."

She reached out, laid a hand on me, drew me to her, and lightly touched
my arm, sending my spirits sky-high. She wasn't going to do