"No, not afraid; I hope I should not be afraid even if I should be going to suffer all that I saw her suffer." "Eunice, why have you not told me before? It was hardly friendly to be silent with any such thought in your mind." "Well, it is as I said. A little sooner or later could make no difference." "And because you did not like to make your friends unhappy you ran this risk." The doctor was standing with his face to the door at which Fidelia at the moment entered, and his tone changed. "Well, to-morrow you must send your little girl down to see my little girls, unless they should hear of her home-coming, and be up here this afternoon. No; they shall not come, nor any one else. You shall have this day to yourselves. And mind one thing--there must be no school-books about during vacation time. Miss Eunice, I will trust to you to see to that." And then he went away. CHAPTER TWO. THE SISTERS. "Are you really well, Eunice? You don't look very well," said Fidelia, kneeling down beside her sister, and looking wistfully into her face. "Are you sure that you are well?" "I am pretty well, dear. I have been about all the winter pretty much as usual. Who has been telling that I have not been well?" "No one has written, in so many words, that you were sick. But you don't seem to have been about among the neighbours as much as usual, and you have given up your class in the Sunday school." "Yes, I gave it up for a while, but I have taken it again. I thought I had better give it up in the beginning of the winter, as I could not be quite regular, because of the bad roads. And Mr Fuller--the new teacher--could take it as well as not. He was glad to take it; and he is a born teacher. He has done good work among the boys on Sundays and week-days too. But he has gone away, and I have my class again. Was it because you thought I was sick that you came home, dear?" "Well, I wanted to be sure about you. And I got homesick when I saw the other girls going. I am glad I came: I can help in the garden." "Yes; and ten days in the garden will do more good to your summer work than ten days at your books could do. I am very glad you have come home." "I only brought one book. I must take a little time for it. Now I will get dinner if you will tell me what to do. I am hungry." "Of course you are. And I can scarcely wait to hear all you have to tell me." She did not need to wait. Fidelia laid the table, talking all the time as she went from pantry to cupboard; and Eunice listened as she prepared the dinner with her own hands--as she did every day, for there was no "help" in the house. It was a very simple meal, and it was spread in the room in which it was prepared.