She had only to go to the corner of the building, turn into an open brier and thistle-grown lot, and cross it to the bit of wood at the back of the big house. There, nestled among the trees, she saw the little whitewashed shanty, with clotheslines full of newly washed clothes hanging all around it. “Poor souls!” Roma said to herself. “That is the nearest approach to the country life they long for to be found in the suburbs of the city; and how much better is that little nest in the fragrant pine wood than a room in a stifling tenement house.” As she walked toward the shanty, Lucy, in a red turban and a blue gown, came out of the house with a tub of clothes in her hands, and began to take them out and hang them on the line. She was so intent upon her work that she did not see Miss Fronde until that young lady came immediately behind her and said: “How do you do, Aunt Lucy?” “Who dat?” exclaimed the woman, with a start. “Lor’ b’ess my po’ soul, young miss! I f’ought it was a speerit as spoke, I did, fo’ a fac’! So yo’s com’d back? ’Deed, I’s moughty proud to see yo’, honey. Come in de house. Tom, he’s gone to ca’ay some clo’es home; he’ll stan’ on his head w’en he years yo’ is com’d back—’deed he will!” Roma followed the woman into the shanty, and found the poorest, barest, but cleanest little nest that ever two blackbirds found shelter in. The little bed in the corner, the big stove, with its boiler, and the wooden bench with its washtub, seemed to fill all the space. Roma sat down on a three-legged stool, because there was no better seat in the place. “I am going down to the old house on the Isle of Storms, Lucy. How would you and your boy like to go with me?” inquired Roma. The woman stared at her so stupidly that Miss Fronde repeated the question. Then Lucy burst out suddenly: “Oh, Miss Yoma! ’Ow would I like to go back to dat b’essed ole p’ace? ’Ow would I like to go to hebben, w’en my time come? Not as I’m in any huyey to go dere, neider. I f’ought I was gwine to hebben w’en I ’mancipated de ole p’ace an’ com’d yere. But, Lor’!” “And so you would like to return, then?” “Like! W’y, youn’ mist’ess, I jeams ob it at night. I jeams as I’m back dere in my log house, a-smokin’ ob my sweet corncob pipe by my b’ight pine-knot fire, an’ I feels so happy, an’ finks as it is yeal, an’ dis yere was de jeam. Den I wakes up, an’ sometimes I cwies. It mos’ b’eaks my heart. It do, fo’ a fac’. Sometimes Tom say to me, he say, ‘Mammy, w’at de matter wid yo’?’ An’ I say, ‘Oh, Tom!’ I can say no mo’n dat.” “When can you be ready to go with me, Lucy?” “Any time—dis minit!—w’ich I doane mean zackly dat, but soon’s ebber I finishes ob dem clo’es w’at’s hangin’ on de line, w’ich will be dis werry arternoon, ’ca’se one mus’ keep deir ’gagements, yo’ know, ma’am.” “Certainly,” assented Roma. “But I can be yeady to go to-night or moyer mo’nin’.” “To-morrow morning will be quite time enough.”