She played soft little airs from memory, and her soul was filled with joy. Now she knew she would never be lonely in the new life, for she would always have this wonderful instrument to flee to when she felt homesick. Across the hall were two square rooms, the front one furnished as a library. Here were rows of books behind glass doors. Marcia looked at them with awe. Might she read them all? She resolved to cultivate her mind that she might be a fit companion for David. She knew he was wise beyond his years for she had heard her father say so. She went nearer and scanned the titles, and at once there looked out to her from the rows of bindings a few familiar faces of books she had read and re-read. “Thaddeus of Warsaw,” “The Scottish Chiefs,” “Mysteries of Udolpho,” “Romance of the Forest,” “Baker’s Livy,” “Rollin’s History,” “Pilgrim’s Progress,” and a whole row of Sir Walter Scott’s novels. She caught her breath with delight. What pleasure was opening before her! All of Scott! And she had read but one! It was with difficulty she tore herself away from the tempting shelves and went on to the rest of the house. Back of David’s library was a sunny sitting room, or breakfast room,—or “dining room” as it would be called at the present time. In Marcia’s time the family ate most of their meals in one end of the large bright kitchen, that end furnished with a comfortable lounge, a few bookshelves, a thick ingrain carpet, and a blooming geranium in the wide window seat. But there was always the other room for company, for “high days and holidays.” Out of this morning room the pantry opened with its spicy odors of preserves and fruit cake. Marcia looked about her well pleased. The house itself was a part of David’s inheritance, his mother’s family homestead. Things were all on a grand scale for a bride. Most brides began in a very simple way and climbed up year by year. How Kate would have liked it all! David must have had in mind her fastidious tastes, and spent a great deal of money in trying to please her. That piano must have been very expensive. Once more Marcia felt how David had loved Kate and a pang went through her as she wondered however he was to live without her. Her young soul had not yet awakened to the question of how _she_ was to live _with_ him, while his heart went continually mourning for one who was lost to him forever. The rooms upstairs were all pleasant, spacious, and comfortably furnished. There was no suggestion of bareness or anything left unfinished. Much of the furniture was old, having belonged to David’s mother, and was in a state of fine preservation, a possession of which to be justly proud. There were four rooms besides the one in which Marcia had slept: a front and back on the opposite side of the hall, a room just back of her own, and one at the end of the hall over the large kitchen.