"Gals are never much like their brothers, I reckon. They are softer, and finer, and neater; leastways our Daisy was as different from us as different could be, and Melinda is different from Tim. She's been to Camden high-school, and has got a book that she talks French out of; and didn't you ever see that piece she wrote about Mr. Baldwin's boy, who fell from the top of the church when it was building, and was crushed to death? It was printed, all in rhyme, in the Camden _Sentinel_, and Jim has a copy of it in his wallet, 'long with a lock of Melinda's hair. I tell you she's a team." Andy was warming up with his subject, and finding Ethelyn a good listener, he continued: "I want you to like her, and I b'lieve you orter, for if it hadn't been for her this room wouldn't of been fixed up as 'tis. Melinda coaxed mother to buy the carpet, and the curtings, and to put your bed in there. Why, that was the meal room, where you be, and we used to keep beans there, too; but Melinda stuck to it till mother moved the chest and the bags, and then we got some paint, and me and the boys and Melinda painted, and worked, hopin' all the time that you'd be pleased, as I guess you be. We wanted to have you like us." And simple-hearted Andy drew near to Ethelyn, who was softened more by what he said than she could have been by her husband's most urgent appeal. The thought of the people to whom she had been so cold, and even rude, working and planning for her comfort, touched a very tender chord, and had Richard then proffered his request for her to go down, it is very possible she might have done so; but it was too late now, and after Andy left her she lay pondering what he had said and listening to the sound of voices which came up to her from the parlor directly beneath her room where James, and John, and Andy, and the mother, with Melinda, and Eunice, were talking to Richard, who was conscious of a greater feeling of content, sitting there in their midst again, than he had known in many a day. Melinda had been more than disappointed at Mrs. Richard's non-appearance, for aside from a curiosity to see the great lady, there was a desire to be able to report that she seen her to other females equally curious, whom she would next day meet at church. It would have added somewhat to her self-complacency as well as importance in their eyes, could she have quoted Mrs. Richard's sayings, and, described Mrs. Richard's dress, the very first day after her arrival. It would look as if the intimacy, which many predicted would end with Mrs. Ethelyn's coming, was only cemented the stronger; but no such honor was in store for her. Ethelyn declined coming down, and with a good-humored smile Melinda said she was quite excusable; and then, untying her bonnet, she laid it aside, just as she did the indescribable air of stiffness she had worn while expecting Mrs. Richard.