“Mr. Sterling is all right I hope?” Christie never called him David to Kitty; so that impertinent little person took especial pains to speak familiarly, sometimes even fondly of him to Christie. “Dear fellow! he’s so happy he don’t know what to do with himself. I just wish you could see him go round smiling, and singing, and looking as if he’d like to dance.” “That looks as if he was going to get a chance to do it,” said Christie, with a glance at the gloves, as Kitty turned from the counter. “So he is!” laughed Kitty, patting the little parcel with a joyful face. “I do believe you are going to be married:” exclaimed Christie, half distracted with curiosity. “I am, but not to Miles. Now don’t you say another word, for I’m dying to tell, and I promised I wouldn’t. David wants to do it himself. By-by.” And Kitty hurried away, leaving Christie as pale as if she had seen a ghost at noonday. She had; for the thought of David’s marrying Kitty had haunted her all those months, and now she was quite sure the blow had come. “If she was only a nobler woman I could bear it better; but I am sure he will regret it when the first illusion is past. I fancy she reminds him of his lost Letty, and so he thinks he loves her. I pray he may be happy, and I hope it will be over soon,” thought Christie, with a groan, as she trudged away to carry comfort to those whose woes could be relieved by tea and sugar, flannel petticoats, and orders for a ton of coal. It was over soon, but not as Christie had expected. That evening Mr. Power was called away, and she sat alone, bravely trying to forget suspense and grief in copying the record of her last month’s labor. But she made sad work of it; for her mind was full of David and his wife, so happy in the little home which had grown doubly dear to her since she left it. No wonder then that she put down “two dozen children” to Mrs. Flanagan, and “four knit hoods” with the measles; or that a great blot fell upon “twenty yards red flannel,” as the pen dropped from the hands she clasped together; saying with all the fervor of true self-abnegation: “I hope he will be happy; oh, I hope he will be happy!” If ever woman deserved reward for patient endeavor, hard-won submission, and unselfish love, Christie did then. And she received it in full measure; for the dear Lord requites some faithful hearts, blesses some lives that seem set apart for silent pain and solitary labor. Snow was falling fast, and a bitter wind moaned without; the house was very still, and nothing stirred in the room but the flames dancing on the hearth, and the thin hand moving to and fro among the records of a useful life.