“No, he’s able to be up in a wheel chair now. The janitor of the store’s old father had a wheel chair and they didn’t sell it after he died and it was up attic and he brought it to Father. He said Father had helped him out at the store when his little boy was sick. Oh, lots of the folks from the store have come to help out. The delivery driver, he said he couldn’t ever forget what Father did for him one time. He won’t tell what it was because he’s ashamed. Only he wanted to help out, too, and as long as we had to have a furnace fire he came in every morning and night to look out for the furnace. And he steps in daytimes now, when he’s going by, to see if everything is all right. And old Mrs. Hennessy, she’s the cleaning woman, she kept coming all the time to help and bring in things to eat, pies, you know! She came in nights and mornings when Father was so bad to do up the work and wouldn’t take any pay for it. She doesn’t have to now, do the work, I mean. But she still does the washings. Only we pay her, of course.” Aunt Mattie’s look of bewilderment sharpened to distraction. “You have only got me more mixed up than ever!” she cried vacantly. “Mercy me! the furnace, the washings.... Yes, I see about those. But all the rest! The meals! The housework! _Stephen!_ When I think of how your poor mother slaved to....” She looked at them almost sternly as if suspecting them of levity. Henry said, “Father and all of us get along. You see Father’s all right now, only his legs. He can do anything except walk. And Helen and I do the walking for him.” Mrs. Farnham made an exasperated gesture at their refusal to take in her meaning. “_Who does the cooking?_” she shouted desperately, getting down to bed-rock. “Father does. We all do,” said Helen. “Father’s a lovely cook. He’s learning out of the cook-book. And so am I--learning, I mean. We’re learning together.” Aunt Mattie’s face instantly smoothed into comprehension of everything. She had wondered how they managed without a woman to keep house for them. Now she knew. They didn’t manage. “_Oh_ ...” she said, and, “Well....” She looked at them compassionately. “I’ll have to get over to your house as fast as ever I can,” she said as if to herself. As her eyes dwelt half-absently on the children, she observed aloud, “Seems to me Henry’s looking better. Not so peaked. Did that pepsin treatment of Dr. Merritt’s really do him some good? I never thought much of pepsin, myself.” The children looked at each other as if surprised by something they had not noticed before. “Why, Henry, that’s so. You haven’t had one of your sick spells for ever so long, have you?” said Helen. To her Aunt Mattie she explained, “We’ve had so much else to think about we haven’t noticed.” Mrs. Farnham rejected pepsin for another diagnosis. “_I_ know what ’tis. The visit to your Gramma and Grampa Houghton! I always told your Momma that what Henry needed was country air. There’s nothing like a change of air, _nothing_!”