“Well, he wanted me to elope with him,” Mrs. North said, gayly; “if that isn't being a beau, I don't know what is. I haven't thought of it for years.” “If you've finished your curds you must lie down,” said Miss North. “Oh, I'll just look about--” “No; you are tired. You must lie down.” “Who is that stout old gentleman going into the Price house?” Mrs. North said, lingering at the window. “Oh, that's your Alfred Price,” her daughter answered; and added that she hoped her mother would be pleased with the house. “We have boarded so long, I think you'll enjoy a home of your own.” “Indeed I shall!” cried Mrs. North, her eyes snapping with delight. “Mary, I'll wash the breakfast dishes, as my mother used to do!” “Oh no,” Mary North protested; “it would tire you. I mean to take every care from your mind.” “But,” Mrs. North pleaded, “you have so much to do; and--” “Never mind about me,” said the daughter, earnestly; “you are my first consideration.” “I know it, my dear,” said Mrs. North, meekly. And when Old Chester came to make its call, one of the first things she said was that her Mary was such a good daughter. Miss North, her anxious face red with determination, bore out the assertion by constantly interrupting the conversation to bring a footstool, or shut a window, or put a shawl over her mother's knees. “My mother's limb troubles her,” she explained to visitors (in point of modesty, Mary North did not leave her mother a leg to stand on); then she added, breathlessly, with her tremulous smile, that she wished they would please not talk too much. “Conversation tires her,” she explained. At which the little, pretty old lady opened and closed her hands, and protested that she was not tired at all. But the callers departed. As the door closed behind them, Mrs. North was ready to cry. “Now, Mary, really!” she began. “Mother, I don't care! I don't like to say things like that, though I'm sure I always try to say them politely. But to save you I would say anything!” “But I enjoy seeing people, and--” “It is bad for you to be tired,” Mary said, her thin face quivering still with the effort she had made; “and they sha'n't tire you while I am here to protect you.” And her protection never flagged. When Captain Price called, she asked him to please converse in a low tone, as noise was bad for her mother. “He had been here a good while before I came in,” she defended herself to Mrs. North, afterwards; “and I'm sure I spoke politely.” The fact was, the day the Captain came, Miss North was out. Her mother had seen him pounding up the street, and hurrying to the door, called out, gayly, in her little, old, piping voice, “Alfred--Alfred Price!”