"I have been used to consider this house my own home, for thirty-seven years, and if I leave it, I wonder what kind of housekeeping will go on in it, with a college woman to superintend things? You would be left to the servant lasses, and their doings and not-doings would be enough to turn my hair gray." "Then, mother, you will stay here, as I propose?" "I cannot do my duty, and leave." "I thank you, mother." Then, turning to his sisters, he said: "I hope you are satisfied, girls." "There is no other course for us," answered Isabel. "We must stay where mother stays. It would be unkind to leave her now--when you are practically leaving her." "I hope Theodora will be nice," said Christina. "If she is, we may be happy." "Do your best, Christina, to make all pleasant, and you will please me very much," said Robert. "And, Isabel, I am not leaving any of you. Marriage will not alter me in regard to my relationship to mother, yourself, and Christina. I promise you that." "If you intend to make many alterations in the house, you will have to see about them at once," said Mrs. Campbell. "To-morrow I shall send men to remove all the old furniture from the rooms I intend to decorate." "To remove it! Where to?" "To Bailey's auction rooms." "Robert Campbell! Your poor, dear father's rooms, and he not gone two years yet!" "To-morrow will be nine days short of the two years. Do you wish his rooms to remain untouched for nine days longer, mother?" "It is no matter. Let his lounge, and his chair and his bagatelle board go--let all go! The dead, as well as the living, must make way for Theodora." "And, mother, as the hall will be entirely changed, and there will be much traffic through it, you had better remove early in the morning those huge glass cases of impaled insects and butterflies. If you wish to keep them, take them to your rooms; if not, let them go to Bailey's." "They may as well go with the rest. Your father valued them highly in this life, but----" "They are the most lugubrious, sorrowful objects. They make me shudder. How could any one imagine they were ornamental?" "Your father thought them to be very curious and instructive, and they cost a great deal of money." "If during the night you remember any changes you would like to make, we can discuss them in the morning," said Robert. He went out gaily, and as he closed the door, began to sing: "_My love is like a red, red rose, That's newly blown in June; My Love is like a melody, That's sweetly played in tune._" Then the library shut in the singer and the song, and all was silence.