"A sweet-looking old lady passed the house this afternoon," said Cordelia, "and took notice of baby asleep in my arms on the porch. She stopped and asked me all about her and presently she kissed her, and then I saw that she was crying softly to herself. I asked her if she had ever lost a little girl, and she said no. 'I have always been childless,' said the sweet old lady. 'In all the years of my wifehood I have besought but one blessing of heaven--the joy of maternity. My prayers are unanswered, and it is perhaps better so.' She told me then that her husband did not care for children; she could hardly reconcile his professed antipathy to them with his warm, gentle, and loyal nature; but it was well, if he did not want children, that none had come." "What was the old lady's name?" I asked. "Mrs. Blossom," said my wife Cordelia. I whistled softly to myself. Then I told Cordelia of my experience with Mr. Blossom, and we wondered where and when and how this pathetic comedy of cross-purposes would end. We talked the matter over many a time after that, and we agreed that it would be hard to find an instance of deception more touching than that which we had met with in the daily life of Mr. and Mrs. Blossom. Meanwhile the two old people became more and more attached to our precious baby. Every morning brought Mr. Blossom down the street with a smile and a caress and a tender word for the little one, that toddled to meet him and overwhelm him with her innocent prattle. Every afternoon found the sweet-looking old lady in front of our house, fondling our child, and feeding her starving maternal instinct upon the little one's caresses. Each one--the old gentleman and the old lady--each one confessed by action and by word to an overwhelming love for children, yet between them stood that pitiless lie, conceived of the tenderest consideration for each other, but resulting in lifelong misery. I tell you, it was mighty hard sometimes for Cordelia and me not to break out with the truth! It occurred to us both that there would eventually come a time when the friendship of Mr. and Mrs. Blossom would be precious indeed to our daughter. We had great hopes of that child, and all our day-dreams involved her. She must go to school, she must be educated, she must want nothing; there was no conceivable sacrifice which Cordelia and I would not make gladly for our little girl. Would we be willing to share her love with these two childless old people, who yearned for that love and were ready to repay it with every benefit which riches can supply? We asked ourselves that question a thousand times. God helped us to answer it.