"Now, my dears, how foolish I was and how wasteful of precious time! There is so much to be done for them and for ourselves. Gaspar's business must not suffer, nor Son's (as she always called her eldest), nor his brothers'. There are new hospitals to equip and nurses to secure. Alas! there should be a Home made ready, even so soon, for the widows and orphans of our soldiers. Let us organize into a regular band of workers; just ourselves, as systematically as your father has trained us to believe is best. There are six of us, a little army of supplies and reinforcements. Though, Honoria, my daughter, shall I count upon you?" "Surely, Mother darling, though not here. Thanks to the hospital course you let me enjoy, I can follow my father and brothers to the front. I am a trained nurse, you know, and some will need me there." The Sun Maid caught her breath with a little gasp. Then again she smiled. "Of course, Honoria; if you wish it. It is only one more to give; yet you will be in little danger and your father in so much the less because of your presence. Now let us apportion the other duties and set about them." This was quickly done; and to the mother herself remained the assumption of all monetary affairs in her husband's private office in their last new home; where, when they had removed to it, she had inquired: "Why such a palace, Gaspar, for two plain, simple folk like you and me? It is big enough for a barrack, and those great empty 'blocks' on every side remind me of our old days in Mercy's log cabin among the woods." "I like it, dear. There will be room in this big house to entertain guests of every rank and station as they should be entertained in our dear city. These empty squares about us shall keep their old trees intact, but the grounds shall be beautified by the highest landscape art, to which the full view of our grand lake will give crowning charm. When we have done with it all we will give it to the little children for a perpetual playground. Even the proposed new enlargement of the city limits will hardly encroach upon us here." "But it will, Gaspar, it surely will! When I hark back, as Abel used to say, I find Katasha's prophecies and my old dreams more than fulfilled. But the end is not yet, nor soon." Now that her daughters were scattered to their various points of usefulness and the Sun Maid was left alone with Hugh's one motherless child--another Kitty--the great house seemed more empty than ever; and its brave mistress resolved to people it with something more substantial and needy than memories. So she gathered about her a host to whom the cruel war had brought distress of one form or another; while out among the trees of the park she erected a great barrack, fitted with every aid to comfort and convalescence. This, like the mansion, was speedily filled, and the "Keith Rest" became a household word throughout the land.