"Dat's jest de way ob it, missie. And, look ye, too dat ongrateful, graspin' wilyun has done threaten your pore gran'pa, time and ag'in, to pack bofe of you'uns off to de pore-house." "The unnatural monster!" exclaimed little Golden, in a perfect tempest of passionate wrath. "Well you may say so," cried Dinah, in a fever of sympathy. "De debbil will nebber git his due till he gets John Glenalvan! De blood biles in my ole vains when I fink ob all de insults dat man has heaped on his own fader, 'long ob you and your pore misguided mudder." Beautiful little Golden sat upright regarding the excited old woman in grave silence. Her blue eyes were on fire with indignation and grief. At times she would murmur: "Poor, dear grandpa, dear true-hearted grandpa," and relapse into silence again. She roused herself at last from her musing mood, and looked up at Dinah. There was a hopeful light in the soft, blue eyes, so lately drowned in tears of sorrow and despair. "Black mammy, I have been thinking," she said, "and I will tell you what I mean to do." "What, honey?" "I will tell you a secret, mammy. Mr. Chesleigh loves me. We are--that is, I will be his wife one of these days." "Miss Golden, is dat so?" cried black mammy, delighted. "I am so glad! I was 'fraid--well, nebber min' what I was 'fraid of, chile; but 'deed I is so glad dat Mr. Chesly's gwine to marry you. He is a rich man, honey. You kin snap your lily fingers at ugly Marse John, when once you is Mr. Chesly's wife." "Yes, he is very rich, black mammy," said the girl, with a pretty, almost childish complacency. "He has told me so, and he tells me I shall have jewels and fine dresses, and all that heart could desire when I go to live with him--I mean," blushing rosy red, "when I become his wife." "And powerful pretty you will look in dem fine tings, honey," said her black mammy, admiringly. "But the best thing of all, black mammy, is that I shall be able to take grandpa away from this place, and love him and care for him," cried Golden, exultantly. "I shall take you, too, mammy, for you have been the only mother I ever knew. Grandpa shall have the happiest home in the world, and Bert and I will both love him dearly, dearly!" "And your pore, lost mudder, darlin', you had forgotten her," said Dinah, a little wistfully, her thoughts straying back through the mist of years, to the lost little nursling who had fluttered from the safe parental nest, and steeped the white wings of her soul in the blackness of sin. But Golden shook her dainty head decidedly. "No, black mammy, I had not forgotten," she said. "When I am Bert's wife, he shall help me to seek and save my poor, lost mother. We will try to win her back to the path of right, and save her soul for Heaven," she concluded, with girlish ardor and fervency.