Curlypate," said Mr. Blake as he put down his cane, "you don't
scold worth a cent!" And he lifted her up and kissed her.

And then Mamma Blake smiled, and they all sat down to the table. While
they ate, Mr. Blake told about his morning visits, and spoke of Parm'ly
without coal, and Peter Sitles with no broom-machine, and described
little Ben Sitles' hungry face, and told how he had visited the widow
Martin, who had no sewing-machine, and who had to receive help from the
overseer of the poor. The overseer told her that she must bind out her
daughter, twelve years old, and her boy of ten, if she expected to have
any help; and the mother's heart was just about broken at the thought of
losing her children.

Now, while all this was taking place, Willie Blake, the minister's son, a
boy about thirteen years of age, sat by the big porcelain water-pitcher,
listening to all that was said. His deep blue eyes looked past the
pitcher at his father, then at his mother, taking in all their
descriptions of poverty with a wondrous pitifulness. But he did not say
much. What went on in his long head I do not know, for his was one of
those heads that projected forward and backward, and the top of which
overhung the base, for all the world like a load of hay. Now and then his
mother looked at him, as if she would like to see through and read his
thoughts. But I think she didn't see anything but the straight, silken,
fine, flossy hair, silvery white, touched a little bit--only a little--as
he turned it in looking from one to the other, with a tinge of what
people call a golden, but what is really a sort of a pleasant straw
color. He usually talked, and asked questions, and laughed like other
boys; but now he seemed to be swallowing the words of his father and
mother more rapidly even than he did his dinner; for, like most boys, he
ate as if it were a great waste of time to eat. But when he was done he
did not hurry off as eagerly as usual to reading or to play. He sat and
listened.

"What makes you look so sober, Willie?" asked Helen, his sister.

"What you thinkin', Willie?" said Curlypate, peering through the pitcher
handle at him.

"Willie," broke in his father, "mamma and I are going to a wedding out at
Sugar Hill----"

"Sugar Hill; O my!" broke in Curlypate.

"Out at Sugar Hill," continued Mr. Blake, stroking the Curlypate, "and as
I have some calls to make, we shall not be back till bedtime. I am sorry
to keep you from your pla