She opened the door for Maude to pass out, and stood listening till she heard her talking to Uncle Phil; then with a sob she crouched upon the hearth and wept bitterly. Maude’s presence had brought back all the dreadful past, and even seemed for a time to have resuscitated her girlish love for Charlie, while in her heart there was a fierce hungering for Charlie’s friends, for recognition by them, or at least recognition by Roy, who had called her his “dear little sister.” It was the memory of these words which quieted Edna at last. He had had her in his mind when he sent the jet, and perhaps he would think of her again, and sometime she might see him and know just how good he was; and as Becky called to say supper was waiting, she hastily bathed her face, and giving a few brushes to her hair, went down to the room where Maude, full of life and spirits, was chatting gayly with Uncle Phil, and showing him the watch which Roy Leighton had given her. As Edna came in, Uncle Phil glanced anxiously at her, detecting at once the traces of agitation upon her face, and as Maude suddenly remembered leaving her pocket-handkerchief upstairs, and darted away after it before sitting down to the table, he improved her absence by saying, softly: “What is it, little _Lu_? Has Maude brought the past all back again? Yes, yes, I was afraid she would.” “Not that exactly,” Edna said, with a quivering lip and smothered sob; “but, Uncle Phil, _that_ was _my_ watch once,—Charlie gave it to me, and—and—I sold it, you remember, in Albany. I knew it in a moment.” “Yes, yes. Lord bless my soul! things does work curis. Your watch, and Roy Leighton bought it for Maude! there couldn’t a likelier person have it, but that don’t help its hurting. Poor little Lu! don’t fret; I’ll buy you one, handsomer than that, when I sell my wool. You bet I will. Yes, yes.” He took a large pinch of snuff, and adroitly threw some of it in Edna’s eyes, so that their redness, and the tears streaming from them, were accounted for to Maude, who came tripping in, all anxiety to know what was the matter with “_Little Dot_,—that’s what I call her, she is so very small,” she said to Uncle Phil, as she took her seat at the table, talking all the time,—now of her school, now of Aunt Burton, and Georgie who was in Chicago, and at last of Charlie Churchill’s tragical death, and the effect it had on his mother.