Said Evangeline with a sigh: "I'll try standin' up. I guess I kind of mixed you up, didn't I? You see, what I _meant_ was, could I make Stefana's birthday cake over here to your house where she can't hear me stirrin'?" "Oh, Stefana's birthday! That is why she was 'born to-morrow.'" "Yes'm, in a thunder storm. I've heard Mother tellin'. It will have to be a graham cake." "A--what kind of cake, Evangeline? Maybe you'd better try sitting down; I don't think I just understand." "No'm, no'm, I guess you wouldn't, because you probably can always 'ford white flour. I thought if I frosted it over real white, it would hide the grahamness. I've got two eggs." Understanding came to Miss Theodosia, though a little slowly. Was she growing stupid? "Evangeline, we'll make Stefana's cake together; we'll take turns 'stirrin''! We'll do it over here and keep it a beautiful secret." The child was standing up now certainly, her wiry little body a-tilt with excitement, a-quiver with it. Evangeline's eyes shone. "Oh, I knew you would! I knew you would! You're such a _nangel!_ If you was a kind of folks that liked to be kissed--" The soft pink of Miss Theodosia's cheeks! She lifted her head and sat very still. "Come and try me, dear. Maybe I am that kind of folks." And in a little whirlwind of tender gratitude descended Evangeline upon her. It was a whole-souled kiss, the only brand possible to Evangeline. "I--I am that kind!" gasped Miss Theodosia, emerging laughing but tender-eyed. "Now let's begin the cake." "Oh, yes, mercy gracious, yes! I'll go get the eggs 'n' graham flour, an'--an' molasses. Could we sweeten it with molasses, Miss Theodosia? It'll take all o' my sugar for the frostin'. We are pretty used to bein' sweetened with molasses--" Miss Theodosia had a swift mental taste on her tongue of Stefana's graham birthday cake, molasses-sweet. There were her heartstrings at their odd little twitching again! "You won't have to go home at all, Evangeline. I've got all the materials--" but at sight of the child's face, a little fallen and troubled, she hastily appended--"except the eggs. I guess you'd better go home and get those." "Two!" sang Evangeline joyously, already on her way; "I've got two. Two's a lot of eggs, isn't it?" They mixed and beat and stirred together, and Evangeline never knew how many more eggs than two went into the rich golden batter. Elly Precious, tied for safety-first into one of Miss Theodosia's chairs, looked on with an interest more or less intermittent; when Evangeline's offerings of "teeny speckles" of toothsome batter were delayed, the interest flagged. The baking time was for Evangeline a period of utmost anxiety--there were so many direful things that might happen to Stefana's cake. If it fell down or burned up--