Aunt Jane was really glad to. Helen kept the two girls busy until the things were put away and the kitchen tidied up. The fire was out and the room getting cooler. The girls clung so to Helen, that she felt as if she would be torn in two. And sitting on the steps they wanted to know about the queer old woman, and didn't Mrs. Dayton make a pile of money? 'Reely thought when she was grown up she would keep boarders and have a servant. Did Joanna do everything? "Oh, no. Mrs. Dayton helps, and I do a good many things when Mrs. Van Dorn does not want me." "Is she very cross?" "Oh, no," with a laugh of amusement. "Not as cross as mother?" with childish frankness. "You all annoy Aunt Jane so," returned Helen. "If you would go at once and do as she tells you, and try to remember." "But I forget so easily," moaned Aurelia. "And I just hate to work." "What would you like to do?" "Play, and go out in the woods, and nutting. Oh, when will it be nut time? And then there's school." "One can't play forever unless one wants to be a dunce." "I like dolls," interposed Fanny. "And I'm making clothes for them. Oh, have you any pretty pieces?" "It's time you youngsters went to bed," declared their mother. "Where's Helen going to sleep?" "Don't you worry about Helen." The girls came and kissed her. Then she sat in the fragrant dusk and heard a whippoor-will; and Uncle Jason and Joe Northrup comparing crops, and telling yields of certain years. Aunt Jane fell asleep in the quiet. Jenny came down to her step and asked about styles, and what was in the stores, and if prices had gone down. Joe went home presently, and Jenny said, "Now come. You're going to sleep with me. This'll be your room when I'm gone. Oh, dear! I suppose some day you'll be married, too. Don't you take a fellow unless he has a house to put you in." Helen felt in a strange whirl, but after awhile she slept. And Sunday morning was all confusion again. Joe and Jenny and Sam went to church; the company came, and Helen helped with the dinner, making the table look so pretty and tidy, that the dining-room was very pleasant. The four younger children were out in the kitchen, and once Aunt Jane had to go out and administer slaps all round to quell a riot. Martha and her lover were very staid and sedate. Jane, the younger sister, was rather flighty, and plied Helen with innumerable questions about North Hope. She had heard the young girls went out every day to see the stores and catch the beaus as they came home from work. And did the people in her house have dancing parties every Saturday night? She had read in some magazine that it was the fashion to do so. The two mothers were much engrossed with the coming marriages. The young people walked down to see Jenny's house; there was a light supper, and then they said good-by to each other.