Such were Johnnie’s words, and they fell soothingly on the father’s heart, making him think he had not lost everything which made his life desirable. He had his children still, and he had Dora too. She was in the nursery now, with Ben and Burt clinging to her neck, and asking why she cried when they were so glad to have her back, asking, too, what made mamma so cold, and why she was sleeping in that long queer box on the parlor table. They did not know what death meant, and continued their questionings until their eyelids closed in slumber, and they forgot the long box on the parlor table, with the mother sleeping in it. The night was hot and sultry, and as Dora lay tossing restlessly, she fancied she heard a sound from the parlor, which was just beneath her room, and throwing on her dressing-gown she went noiselessly down the stairs to the parlor door, which was open, and saw a little form kneeling by the coffin and talking to the unconscious dead. “O mother, maybe you can hear me; I’m Johnnie, and I’m so sorry I was ever bad to you, and made your head ache so! Poor mother, I used to think I loved Aunt Dora best, but now I know I didn’t! There’s nothing like a mother, and I was going to tell you so when you got home, but you’re dead and I can’t! O mother! mother! will you never know?” “She does; she did know, Johnnie, for I told her,” Dora said, advancing into the room and taking the child in her arms; “I told her you were sorry, and she forgave you freely, sending you messages of love, and bidding me cut her longest, brightest curl for you. I did so, Johnnie; it is in my room, and to-morrow you shall have it.” “Why not to-night?” Johnnie pleaded, and so his aunt brought him the lock of hair cut from Margaret’s head, the mother’s last memento, which Johnny took with him to his room, sleeping more quietly because of that tress of hair upon his pillow. It was a long procession which followed Margaret to her grave, and for the sake of Johnnie the sexton again tolled for the dead, until the husband and the sister wished the sad sounds would cease. Sadly they returned to the house, leaving Margaret behind them, and missing her more than one month ago they would have thought it possible. But as the days went by the family gradually resumed its wonted cheerfulness, for Dora was there still: their head, their blessing, and comforter. Many lonely hours Squire Russell experienced, it is true, but there was always a solace in knowing that Dora would welcome him home after a brief and necessary absence; that Dora would preside at his table, and keep his children in order; that Dora, in short, would do everything which the most faithful of sisters could do. The children, too, clung to Dora even more than they were wont to do; and little Daisy, taught by Clem, the nurse-maid, called her _mamma_, a name which Ben and Burt were quick to catch, and which Dora did not like to hear, especially if the father chanced to be present.