"There, there, John, I--I didn't mean to--truly I didn't!" quavered the little old lady. John dropped on one knee and caught the fluttering fingers. "Mother, what is it?" "It--it isn't anything; truly it isn't," urged the tremulous voice. "Is any one unkind to you?" John's eyes grew stern. "The boys, or--Margaret?" The indignant red mounted to the faded cheek. "John! How can you ask? Every one is kind, kind, so very kind to me!" "Well, then, what is it?" There was only a sob in reply. "Come, come," he coaxed gently. For a moment Nancy Wetherby's breath was held suspended, then it came in a burst with a rush of words. "Oh, John, John, I'm so useless, so useless, so dreadfully useless! Don't you see? Not a thing, not a person needs me. The kitchen has the cook and the maids. The baby has two or three nurses. Not even this room needs me--there's a girl to dust it each day. Once I slipped out of bed and did it first--I did, John; but she came in, and when I told her, she just curtsied and smiled and kept right on, and--she didn't even skip _one chair_! John, dear John, sometimes it seems as though even my own self doesn't need me. I--I don't even put on my clothes alone; there's always some one to help me!" "There, there, dear," soothed the man huskily. "I need you, indeed I do, mother." And he pressed his lips to one, then the other, of the wrinkled, soft-skinned hands. "You don't--you don't!" choked the woman. "There's not one thing I can do for you! Why, John, only think, I sit with idle hands all day, and there was so much once for them to do. There was Eben, and the children, and the house, and the missionary meetings, and--" On and on went the sweet old voice, but the man scarcely heard. Only one phrase rang over and over in his ears, "There's not one thing I can do for you!" All the interests of now--stocks, bonds, railroads--fell from his mind and left it blank save for the past. He was a boy again at his mother's knee. And what had she done for him then? Surely among all the myriad things there must be one that he might single out and ask her to do for him now! And yet, as he thought, his heart misgave him. There were pies baked, clothes made, bumped foreheads bathed, lost pencils found; there were--a sudden vision came to him of something warm and red and very soft--something over which his boyish heart had exulted. The next moment his face lighted with joy very like that of the years long ago. "Mother!" he cried. "I know what you can do for me. I want a pair of wristers--red ones, just like those you used to knit!" * * * * * It must have been a month later that John Wetherby, with his two elder sons, turned the first corner that carried him out of sight of his house. Very slowly, and with gentle fingers, he pulled off two bright red wristers. He folded them, patted them, then tucked them away in an inner pocket.