“Sure they do,” said Lester. “Everything does nowadays! Henry seems to have grown right out of that weak stomach of his. He eats like a wolf, I tell him. The doctor says they do sometimes outgrow those childish things as they get near their teens.” “Oh, yes, as they get near their teens,” said Mattie. A moment later she asked, “Helen, aren’t you fatter than you used to be? Seems as though you were lots fuller in the face.” “Did you just get around to notice that, Aunt Mattie?” said Helen, laughing. “You ought to see me trying to get into a last summer’s dress. They don’t come together--my!--there’s that much of a gap.” She showed with her hands how wide a gap it was. “Helen has put on eight pounds,” explained Lester. “The school nurse says all the children are gaining like everything, now they serve milk at recess-time.” “Oh, yes, milk at recess-time,” said Aunt Mattie. Helen and Henry finished their cookies and tore out to inspect their poultry. The children and Lester had gone into the chicken-business on a small scale and were raising some brooder chicks in a packing-case chicken-house in the back yard. Stephen was there already, hanging over the low wire-netting “watching their tail-feathers grow,” as he said. Lester quoted this as he wheeled himself to the open door where Mattie stood looking out at the children fussing maternally over the little peeping yellow balls. “Honest to goodness, Mattie, their tail and wing feathers do come in so fast you can see them grow.” He added, “_I’m_ watching feathers grow, too. Stephen is fairly sprouting wings he’s so good! It’s because he can play out of doors again, I suppose, after the winter. We’ve had such lovely weather of late.” “Yes, it must be because he can play out of doors again,” said Aunt Mattie. As they turned back into the kitchen, where a batch of bread was ready to be put into the oven, she asked, “Lester, aren’t you better of your indigestion lately?” “Sh!” he warned her whimsically, his finger at his lips. “Don’t mention it aloud. I haven’t had any in months. But I don’t want it spoken about. Leave sleeping dogs lie. The doctor always said it was nervous, you know. I don’t know much about the geography of my innards, but I’ve thought once or twice that maybe that awful shake-up my nervous system got might have sorted things over into the right pile, as far as digestion goes. It’s not, however,” he said with a sudden grim, black look at his paralyzed legs, “a cure for indigestion that I could recommend.” The tears sprang into Mattie’s eyes as she turned her face away, “It’s pretty _hard_!” “I don’t pretend it’s any picnic. But it’s of no consequence of course.” He was able to say this with a bare and utter sincerity.