"Certainly you can, you are quite old enough to undertake the task of making these old people happier for an afternoon." Into the girl's mind came a remembrance of her birthday gift. "I will be glad to do it, Hennie," she agreed with great seriousness. They paused at Mrs. Henderson's gate as they returned from the Lucinda Home. "Won't you come in, dear?" urged the older woman. The girl, dreamily engaged in planning marvelous but impossible entertainments for the stirring up of the old ladies, did not hear. "Come and have tea with a solitary somebody?" the widow begged the girl wistfully. "You think that the Lucinda Home is lonesome, but don't forget that an old lady who loved your mother and who loves you is lonesome, too." "Dearest Hennie, you haven't the slightest idea of what loneliness is." Virginia smiled sweetly at the older woman and kissed her. "I would enjoy taking tea with you but I must not forget my father. Probably all afternoon he has been making plans to help the people who work in his mill. I think he is so like my mother--always trying to make other people happier. You loved her, Hennie, and you know him. I want you to help me to be unselfish like them." During this recital, Mrs. Henderson underwent a severe test in self-repression, the high praise of Obadiah's disinterestedness nearly causing severe internal injury. There was yet an ominous flash in her eye as she bade the girl farewell. Virginia found her father awaiting her. His digestive organs were protesting by certain unpleasant twinges, against the extra work he had forced upon them. "Where have you been?" he demanded of her sharply. She dropped into the chair by his side. "At Mrs. Henderson's, Daddy." "You left me alone," he complained. "You went to sleep and I was so lonesome, Daddy dear." "That makes no difference. You should not have left me. You have the week days to yourself. I ought to have your Sundays." "Oh, I am sorry that I was so thoughtless," Virginia reproached herself, with a suspicion of tears in her eyes. "Yes, you were thoughtless," Obadiah grumbled. "You must learn to think of others. Don't get teary. That always disturbs me." Virginia was engaged in a battle to keep back her tears when the notes of a ragtime melody resounded through the calm of the Sabbath evening. Ike approached. The gorgeousness of his apparel eliminated every variety of lily, except the tiger, from consideration. His suit was of electric blue. His shirt was white, broadly striped with royal purple, and it peeped modestly from beneath a tie of crimson. His hat was straw, decorated with a sash of more tints than the bow of promise. Ike was happy. He had loitered through the afternoon before the meeting house of his faith, impressing the brethren and the sisters with the magnificence of his attire. He deemed it, socially speaking, to have been a perfect day.