"I guess they came to Edgham after you went away. They bought that big house on the hill near the church. They are very rich. There are Mr. Voorhees and Mrs. Voorhees and their little boy. He doesn't wear long stockings in the coldest weather; his legs are quite bare from a little above his shoes to his knees. I should think he would be cold, but mamma says it is very stylish. He is a pretty little boy, but I don't like him; he looks too much like Mr. Voorhees, and I don't like him. He always acts as if he were laughing at something inside, and you don't know what it is. Mrs. Voorhees is very handsome, not quite so handsome as mamma, but very handsome, and she wears beautiful clothes and jewels. They often ask mamma to go to the theatre with them, and they are here quite a good deal. They have dinner-parties and receptions, and mamma goes. We had a dinner-party here last week." "Doesn't father go to the theatre with them?" asked Maria. "No, he never goes. I don't know whether they ask him or not. If they do, he doesn't go. I guess he would rather stay at home. Then I don't believe papa would want to leave me alone until the late train, for often the cook and Irene go out in the evening." Maria looked anxiously at her little sister, who was sitting as close to her as she could get in the divan before the fire. "Does papa look well?" she asked. "Why, yes, I guess so. He looks just the way he always has. I haven't heard him say he wasn't well, nor mamma, and he hasn't had the doctor, and I haven't seen him take any medicine. I guess he's well." Maria looked at the clock, a fine French affair, which had been one of Ida's wedding gifts, standing swinging its pendulum on the shelf between a Tiffany vase and a bronze. "Father must be home soon now, if he comes on that five-clock train," she said. "Yes, I guess he will." In fact, it was a very few minutes before a carriage stopped in front of the house and Evelyn called out: "There he is! Papa has come!" Maria did not dare look out of the window. She arose with trembling knees and went out into the hall as the front door opened. She saw at the first glance that her father had changed--that he did not look well. And yet it was difficult to say why he did not look well. He had not lost flesh, at least not perceptibly; he was not very pale, but on his face was the expression of one who is looking his last at the things of this world. The expression was at once stern and sad and patient. When he saw Maria, however, the look disappeared for the time. His face, which had not yet lost its boyish outlines, fairly quivered between smiles and tears. He caught Maria in his arms. "Father's blessed child!" he whispered in her ear. "Oh, father," half sobbed Maria, "why didn't you send for me before? Why didn't you tell me?"