As he read she watched his face. The light died from her eyes and her chin quivered as she saw the stern lines deepen around his mouth. A minute more, and he had finished the letter and laid it down without a word. "Thaddeus, ye don't mean--he didn't say--" "Read it--I--I can't," choked the old man. She reached slowly for the sheet of paper and spread it on the table before her. _Dear Mother_ [Jehiel had written]: Just a word to tell you we are all O. K. and doing finely. Your letter reminded me that it was about time I was writing home to the old folks. I don't mean to let so many weeks go by without a letter from me, but somehow the time just gets away from me before I know it. Minnie is well and deep in spring sewing and house-cleaning. I know--because dressmaker's bills are beginning to come in, and every time I go home I find a carpet up in a new place! Our boy Fred is eighteen to-morrow. You'd be proud of him, I know, if you could see him. Business is rushing. Glad to hear you're all right and that father's rheumatism is on the gain. As ever, your affectionate and dutiful son, JEHIEL Oh, by the way--about that visit East. I reckon we'll have to call it off this year. Too bad; but can't seem to see my way clear. Bye-bye, J. Harriet Clayton did not cry this time. She stared at the letter long minutes with wide-open, tearless eyes, then she slowly folded it and put it back in its envelope. "Harriet, mebbe-" began the old man timidly. "Don't, Thaddeus--please don't!" she interrupted. "I--I don't want ter talk." And she rose unsteadily to her feet and moved toward the kitchen door. For a time Mrs. Clayton went about her work in a silence quite unusual, while her husband watched her with troubled eyes. His heart grieved over the bowed head and drooping shoulders, and over the blurred eyes that were so often surreptitiously wiped on a corner of the gingham apron. But at the end of a week the little old woman accosted him with a face full of aggressive yet anxious determination. "Thaddeus, I want ter speak ter you about somethin'. I've been thinkin' it all out, an' I've decided that I've got ter kill one of us off." "Harriet!" "Well, I have. A fun'ral is the only thing that will fetch Jehiel and--" "Harriet, are ye gone crazy? Have ye gone clean mad?" She looked at him appealingly. "Now, Thaddeus, don't try ter hender me, please. You see it's the only way. A fun'ral is the--" "A 'fun'ral'--it's murder!" he shuddered. "Oh, not ter make believe, as I shall," she protested eagerly. "It's--" "Make believe!" "Why, yes, of course. _You'll_ have ter be the one ter do it, 'cause I'm goin' ter be the dead one, an'--" "Harriet!" "There, there, _please_, Thaddeus! I've jest got ter see Jehiel and Hannah Jane 'fore I die!" "But--they--they'll come if--"