The rest of the town were not discontented in the least. They thought northeast Wennott was a little far out, themselves. And it was a good three-quarters of a mile from the public square. But the knolls were not to be had any nearer, and those who owned them felt repaid for the walk it took to reach them. The places were larger, the air was fresher and sweeter, and there was only one knoll to rent among them all. Beyond the knolls were the northeast suburbs, built upon as flat land as any the town afforded, and farther on stretched rolling prairie, picturesquely beautiful. It was upon one of the knolls that Mrs. Brady lived, in a square house of an old-fashioned build, having a hall running through the center with rooms on each side. It fronted the west. To the left, as one entered, was the dining-room; to the right, the parlor, whose always open folding doors made the pleasant sitting-room a part of itself. There was a bay window in the east end of the sitting-room, and one's first glance in at the parlor door from the hall always traveled past everything else to rest on the mass of green and blossoms in the bay window. For Mrs. Brady was an expert at floriculture. Here and there on the lawn, not crowded, but just where it seemed natural to find them, were rosebushes of different varieties that waited patiently all winter for the appreciation of their beauty which summer was sure to bring, and among them were some of the kinds Mrs. Brady had loved in the Eastern home of her girlhood. One stepped out from the south door of the sitting-room to find narrow beds for all sorts of summer blooms hugging the house, and looked about to see farther on occasional other beds. Everything was represented in her flower garden, from sweet alyssum and mignonette to roses and lilies, just as a little of all sweet qualities mingled themselves in her disposition. She was no longer young, and she had come to be quite frail. "I hope he will come," she said as she let herself in at the front door. From the shanty she had come the back way, a part of which followed the railroad track, and the walk had not been very long, but wearily she sank down to rest. "He's such a handy boy," she thought. "If he shouldn't come!" And down at the shanty Mrs. O'Callaghan, as she washed vigorously for her boys, was thinking, too. "It's wishin' I am 'twas avenin'," she cried at last, "and then 'twould be off my moind, so 'twould. I can't tell no more than nothin' what Pat'll be sayin'. And what's worse, I can't tell what I want him to be sayin'. 'Tis the best I want him to be doin', but what's the best? If he don't go, there's a chance gone of earnin' what we need. And if he does go, I'll be at my wits' ends to kape him from settlin' that Jim Barrows. It's widows as has their trials when they've sivin b'ys on their hands, and all of 'em foine wans at that." It was a very uncertain day. Cloud followed sunshine, and a sprinkle of rain the cloud, over and over again.