"Dear me, but that's a good idea," said Susan, with sincerest approval. "Well, if I can trust you, I don't mind telling you that it's taken considerable care for me to live along with Matilda. I don't mean anything against her--not rat-poison nor anything like that, you know?--but she hasn't just approved of my living; she's looked upon it as a waste of her time. And I've had to manage pretty careful in consequence. You see, she's my only sister, and she'd have my property anyhow, but if I had to have a nurse or a woman to look out for me long, there'd be no property to leave. She's real sensible, and we both know just how it is, but it's been pleasantest for me to stay more and more in bed and kind of catch at things as I walk, and once in a while I don't eat all day, and so it keeps up her hope and keeps things pleasant." Jane looked paralyzed. "How can you go without food all day?" Susan considered a little. Then she took a big drink of hot tea and confessed. "I don't really. I watch till she goes to the garden, and then I skip down-stairs and make a good meal and lay it all on the cat." Jane sank down on the foot of the bed and burst out laughing again. Again she just couldn't help it. Susan laughed, too; first softly and gingerly, then in a way almost as hearty as her niece's. "Oh me, oh my," the latter declared, after a minute, wiping her eyes. "Well, we'll have a very lively three weeks, I see." "Oh, yes," Susan exclaimed, "and we'll have liver and bacon, and I'll see the neighbors when they come in. I give up seeing them because it made so much trouble, and the way I'm made is--'Anything for peace.' That's what I always used to say to husband, whatever he said. First along I used to say real things, but all the last years I just said whatever he said; anything for peace." "You've finished your tea now," said Jane, rising. "I'll take the tray down while you dress a bit, and then we'll move you into the other room." "Oh, and _how_ I will enjoy it," cried Susan, clasping her hands in ecstasy. "Oh, you Sunshine Jane, you--how glad I am you've come." "I'm glad, too," said Jane. "We'll have an awfully nice time." She ran down-stairs with the tray and found Madeleine sitting in the kitchen, waiting. "Why, how long have you been here?" she asked. Madeleine lifted a rather mournful countenance and tried to smile. "Oh, Miss Grey. I'm so blue. I can't stand this place at all, I don't believe. My situation is going to be unbearable." "What's the matter with it?" "It's so small and petty and spiteful. All last evening I had to sit and listen to gossip. I hate personalities. Why, whatever I do is going to be seen and talked about the minute I do it." Jane looked grave. "That nice woman who came out to meet you didn't look like a gossip." "She isn't, but she sits and listens, and every once in a while she throws oil on the fire by saying, '_I_ never believed the story.'" "Who did the talking?"