“Oh!” replied the woman, following Edith’s glance, and with an odd, scared look coming into her face as she did so, “I _couldn’t_ let ye touch that, Miss; indeed, I couldn’t. Why, ’taint mine, yet; an’ I don’t know now as ’t ever will be.” Then she interrupted herself with an air of deep chagrin. “Why, you mean the melodyun, don’t ye? I thought all the while you meant the sewin’-machine. How stupid! Seem’s if I can’t think o’ anythin’ lately but that sewing-machine. It’s nigh worritted my life out. You see, I bought it last winter of an agent, an’ agreed to pay ten dollars a month for it till ’twas paid for. But, somehow or ruther, Silas hasn’t earned anythin’ to speak of, sence he came back from Georges Banks, an’ things ha’ gone hard; an’ now the time is up, an’ there’s twenty-seven dollars still due. I’ve scraped up twenty, here and there, but I’m lackin’ seven, yet. The man’s comin’ to-day to take the machine, an’ I’ve got to lose all I’ve paid him. That was the bargain. But,”—she hesitated and her thin lip quivered,—“I vow it’s too bad! An’ I don’t believe the law would allow it.” At this instant, as it happened, a step and a heavy rap were heard at the outer door. The woman started. “There he is now!” she exclaimed. “I know his knock’s well ’s I do the minister’s or the doctor’s. ’Xcuse me a minute.” And, with lips shut tight, she left the room. Then the occupants of the sitting-room heard a man’s voice roughly explaining that he could not take the machine to-day, but that he should be along again to-morrow and should certainly take it then if the money was not ready. The woman seemed to have very little to say in reply; and presently, having dismissed her unwelcome caller, she came back into the sitting-room. “About that melodyun, Miss,” she resumed at once with an absent air; “you’d be welcome to play on it, but Salome’s gone over to Hyannis for a visit, an’ she accidentally took the key off with her in her rettycule. Salome’s my daughter,” she added, with a touch of motherly pride. “She’s took lessons. If she was here, _she’d_ play for ye!” What a mischievous spirit it was that prompted Kitty to break forth, in accents as tenderly regretful as any ever attained in the singing of “Sweet Home” itself!— “Salome! Salome! Would—that you—were home!” She wondered herself, the next moment, what had possessed her, realizing that in thus turning the absent daughter’s name to ridicule, she was doing a distinctly rude and unkind thing. She started up, sincerely meaning to apologize. But the woman had turned away, seeming not to have noticed it; and Kitty sank back in her chair again.