Since that time the deacon’s daughter had married, had wept over her dead husband, and smiled upon a little pale-faced, blue-eyed girl, to whom she gave the name of Ellen, for the sake of Walter’s mother. Aunt Debby, the deacon’s maiden sister, occupied a prominent position in the family, who prized her virtues and humored her whims in a way which spoke volumes in her praise. Although unmarried, Aunt Debby declared that it was not her fault, and insisted that her husband, who was to have been, was killed in the war of 1812. Not that she ever saw him, but her fortune had been told for fifty cents by one who pretended to read the future, and as she placed implicit confidence in the words of the seer, she shed a few tears to the memory of the widower who marched bravely to his death, leaving to the world four little children, and to her a life of single-blessedness. For the sake of the four children whose step-mother she ought to have been, she professed a great affection for the entire race of little ones, and especially for Walter, whose father had been her pet. "Walter was the very image of him," she said, and when, on the night of which we are writing, she heard his clear whistle in the distance, she drew her straight-backed chair nearer to the window, and watched for the first appearance of the boy. "That’s Seth again all over," she thought, as she saw him make believe set the dog on Ellen, who had gone to meet him. "That’s just the way Seth used to pester Mary," and she glanced at the meek-eyed woman, moulding biscuits on the pantry shelf. As was usual with Aunt Debby, when Seth was the burden of her thoughts, she finished her remarks with, "Seth allus was a good boy," and then, as she saw Walter take a letter from his pocket and pass it to his grandfather, she hastened to the door, while her pulses quickened with the hope that it might contain some tidings of the wanderer. The letter bore the New York postmark, and glancing at the signature, the deacon said: "It’s from Richard Graham," while both Walter and Aunt Debby drew nearer to him, waiting patiently to know the nature of its contents. "There’s nothing about my boy," the old man said, when he had finished reading, and with a gesture of impatience Walter turned away, saying to himself, "I’d thank him not to write if he can’t tell us something we want to hear," while Aunt Debby went back to her knitting, and the polished needles were wet as they resumed their accustomed click. "Mary," called the deacon, to his daughter, "this letter concerns you more than it does me. Richard’s wife is dead,—killed herself with fashion and fooleries." Advancing toward her father, Mary said: "When did she die, and what will he do with his little girl?"