Coming to the path where they left James and Star, on parting, they found them sitting there, waiting. When Star saw them coming, she instinctively comprehended, and knew that the crisis was over between Edith and John. Star was happy herself over a secret of her own. And together they returned home. John proudly, on arriving in the old-fashioned sitting room, announced to his parents and sister his intended bride, and told them they could take her now, in her bedraggled condition, for their daughter and sister. "Now, will you go with me, Anne, to the city?" asked Edith, after she had been costumed in some of Anne's clothing that fit her narrowly. "I will educate you, and have you for my own dear sister," hugging Anne to her breast. "Some day, Edith; some day," answered Anne, uncertain in her mind. "When will you come after me?" "When I am your real sister, Anne," replied Edith, stroking Anne's golden hair, and then she looked up at Anne's mother, who could not fully realize what it meant for her future life. "You will let her go, Mrs. Winthrope?" "I may some day," answered the good old mother. "I wouldn't want to leave papa and mamma yet, Edith," said Anne, with a happy smile. "You shall return to see them often; so shall I," said Edith. "I will go some time, Edith, after you are my sister," answered the coy Anne. "That will be soon, dear sister," said Edith, folding Anne in her arms and crying with excessive happiness. "You may have two sisters soon, Anne--Star, I am sure, will be your other sister." Star blushed, and therefore told her tale. The family stood on the porch that evening, and listened to the receding sound of the rattling wheels and squeaking springs of the rig, as John drove away with his precious load. "God bless them," said the good old father; and Anne cried when the last hoof beat came down the shadowy roadway. In silence they sat in darkness till they heard the clanking hoofs returning. The mother went in and lighted the lamp; the father went in, the sister went in, the two brothers went in; and they all knelt down in family worship. As the curtain of the passing night drew thickly over the mountains, and the lights in the corridor of the Summit House became dim, and their room dark, Edith knelt down by her bed and offered up her prayers to the Good Lord, who had brought her safely through her troubles; and Star, kneeling by her side, said, "Amen." A few days thereafter, after Edith had written her parents of the happy culmination of her fishing trip, the following message was received by her from them: "Congratulations." So endeth the story of Edith and John. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Edith and John, by Franklin S. Farquhar