Miss Upton had looked upon the parting amenities of the two young people with beaming approval; and Geraldine's first words when they were alone astonished her.

As soon as they were inside the shop and the door closed, the young girl looked earnestly into her friend's eyes. Miss Mehitable returned her regard affectionately. The golden hair had been wound up and secured with Mrs. Barry's hairpins.

"I wish there were some way by which I need never see him again," she said.

"Why, Miss Melody, child, what do you mean? Every word I told you in my letter was true. Perhaps you never got it, but I told you that he is the finest—"

"Yes, yes, I believe it," was the hasty reply. "I did receive your letter, and some time I'll tell you how, and what a comfort it was to me. Oh, Miss Upton"—the girl threw her arms around the stout figure—"I can't tell you what it means to me for you to take me in; and this is your shop you told me of—" she released Miss Mehitable and looked about—"and I'm going to tend it for you and help you in every way I can. It is paradise—paradise to me, Miss Upton."

Her fervor brought a lump to her companion's throat, but she knew that Mrs. Whipp was listening from the sitting-room, and Miss Mehitable did love peace.

"Yes, yes, dear child; it'll all come out right," she said vaguely, patting the white shoulder. "I have another good helper and I want you to meet her. Come with me." She led the girl through the shop.

Mrs. Whipp had retreated violently from the front window when she saw the closed car drive up, and now she was standing, at bay as it were, with eyes fixed on the doorway through which her employer would bring the stranger. Pearl was placidly purring in the last rays of the sinking sun, her milk-white paws tucked under her soft breast, the only unexcited member of the family.

Mrs. Whipp had excuse for staring as the young girl came into view. Short wisps of golden hair waved about her face. Her beauty struck a sort of awe to the militant woman, who was standing on a mental fence in armed neutrality holding herself ready to spring down on that side which would regard the stranger as an interloper come to sponge on Miss Upton, or possibly she might descend upon the other side and endure the newcomer passively.

"This is our little girl, Charlotte," said Miss Mehitable; "our little girl to take care of, and who wants to take care of us. This is Mrs. Whipp, Geraldine."

Charlotte blinked as the newcomer's face relaxed in her appealing smile, and she came forward and took Mrs. Whipp's hard, unexpectant hand in her soft grasp. "Such a fortunate girl I am, Mrs. Whipp," she said, "I'm sure I shall inconvenience you at first (this fact had been too plainly legible on the weazened face to be ignored), but I will try to make up for it—try my very best, and it may not be for long."

Charlotte mumbled some inarticulate greeting, falling an instant victim to the young creature's humility and loveliness.

"I look very queer, I know," continued Geraldine, "but you see I just came down out of the sky."

"She really did," put in Miss Upton. "She came in Mr. Barry's areoplane."

"Shan't I die!" commented Mrs. Whipp, continuing to stare with a pertinacity equal to Rufus Carder's own. "I believe it. She looks like an angel," she thought. Miss Mehitable watched her melting mood with inward amusement.

"What a beautiful cat!" said Geraldine. "She's tame, isn't she? Will she let you touch her?"

"Well," said Charlotte with a broader smile than had been seen on her countenance for many a day, "I guess they don't have cats in the sky." She lifted Pearl and bestowed her in Geraldine's arms.

The girl met the lazy, golden eyes rather timorously, but she took her.

"All the cats where—where I was—were wild—and no one—no one fed them, you see."

"Well, this cat is named Pearl," said Miss Mehitable. "She's Charlotte's jewel and you can bet she does get fed. How about us, Charlotte?" She turned to the waiting table. "I want to give Miss Melody her supper and put her to bed, and after she has slept twelve hours we'll get her to tell us how it feels to fly. Thank Heaven, she's here with no broken bones."

Meanwhile Ben Barry had reached home and made a rather formal toilet for the evening meal. Even before his mother saw it, she knew she was going to be disciplined. While the waitress remained in the room the young man's gravity and meticulous politeness would have intimidated most mothers with a conscience as guilty as Mrs. Barry's. She was forced to raise her napkin several times, not to dry tears, but to conceal smiles which would have been sure to add fuel to the flame.

She showed her temerity by soon dismissing the servant. Her son met her twinkling eyes coldly. She leaned across the table toward him and revealed the handsome teeth he had inherited.

"Now, Benny, don't be ridiculous," she said.

This beginning destroyed his completely. He arrived at his climax at once.

"How could you be so heartless!" he exclaimed. "She had told me she wanted you to love her. Your coldness shocked her."

This appeal, so pathetic to the speaker, caused Mrs. Barry again to raise her napkin to her rebellious lips.

"I tell you," went on Ben heatedly, "she has been through so much that the surprise and humiliation of your manner made her faint."

"Now, dear, be calm. Didn't I bring her to again? Didn't I do up her hair—it's beautiful, but I like it better wound up, in company—didn't I want to give her—"

"Do you suppose," interrupted Ben more hotly, "do you suppose she wasn't conscious, and hurt, too, by her unconventional appearance?"

He was arraigning his parent now with open severity.

"How about my shock, Ben? I'm old-fashioned, you know. You come, leading that odd little waif and displaying so much—well, enthusiasm, wasn't it—wasn't the whole thing a little extreme?"

"Yes, the situation was certainly very extreme. An old rascal had managed to capture that flower of a girl, and made her believe that to save her dead father's good name she must marry him. I come along with the Scout and pick her up out of a field where she was walking, he running, and yelling, and firing his gun at us. There was scarcely time for her to put on a traveling costume to accord with your ideas of decorum, was there?"

Mrs. Barry's eyes widened as they gazed into his accusing ones.

"How dreadful," she said.

"Yes; and even in all her relief at escaping, Miss Melody was in doubt as to whether she was not deserting her father's cause—torn, as the books say, with conflicting emotions. You may think it was all very pleasant."

"Benny, I think it was dreadful! Awfully hard for you, dear; and, oh, that wretch might have disabled the plane and hurt you! Why did I ever let you have it?"

"To save her! That's why you let me have it."

His mother regarded his glowing face. "What a wretched mess!" she was thinking. "What a bother that the girl is so pretty!"

"You remember the other evening when I came home from that motor-cycle trip, and the next day Miss Upton came and told you Miss Melody's story?"

"Yes, dear." Mrs. Barry added apologetically, "I'm afraid I didn't pay strict attention."

"Well, it is a pity that you did not, for I've known ever since that day that Geraldine Melody is the only girl I shall ever marry."

His mother's heart beat faster as she marked the expression in those steady, young eyes.

There was silence for a space between them. She was the first to speak, and she did so with a cool, unsmiling demeanor which reminded him of childhood days when he was in disgrace.

"Then you care nothing for what sort of mind and character are possessed by your future wife. The skin-deep part is all that interests you."

"That's what she said," he responded quickly. "I suggested that she put affairs in a shape where it would be of no use for an irritating conscience to try to make trouble. I urged her to marry me this afternoon before we came home."

Mrs. Barry's nonchalance deserted her with a rush. Her face became crimson.

"How—how criminal!" she ejaculated.

"That's what she said," returned Ben. "She asked if I hadn't a mother. I told her I had a glorious one; and she just looked at me and said: 'And you would do that to her just because I have nice eyes.'"

Mrs. Barry bit her lip and did not love the waif the more that she had been able to defend her.

"What is the use of being a mother!" she ejaculated. "What is the use of expending your whole heart's love on a boy for his lifetime, when he will desert you at the first temptation!"

"Well, she wouldn't let me, dear," said Ben more gently, flushing and feeling his first qualm. "I would stake my life that she is as beautiful within as without and that you would have a treasure as well as I. It wasn't deserting you. I was thinking of you. I felt she was worthy of you and no one else is."

"This is raving, Ben," said his mother, quiet again. "He has escaped," she thought, "and now nothing will come of it." She raised her drooping head and again regarded him deprecatingly. "Let us talk of something else," she added.

"No," he returned firmly; "not until you understand that I am entirely in earnest. You had your love-affair, now I am having mine, and I am going through with it, openly and in the sight of all men. I urged her a second time to marry me this afternoon, and she looked at me soberly with those glorious eyes and her only answer was: 'I want your mother to love me.'" Ben looked off reminiscently. "It encouraged me to hope that she cares for me a little that your coldness bowled her over so completely."

Mrs. Barry looked at him helplessly, and this time when she put up her napkin she touched a corner of her eye.

"We stopped at the landing-field at Townley and had our talk," he went on.

"And she seemed refined?" Mrs. Barry's voice was a little uncertain.

"Exquisite!" he exclaimed.

"You have standards, Ben," she said. "You couldn't be totally fooled by beauty."

He smiled upon her for the first time and a very warming light shone in his eyes. "The best," he replied, leaning toward her. "You."

She drew a long, quavering breath; but she scorned weeping women.

Ben watched her repressed emotion.

"Now you examine, Mother," he said gently. "Take your New England magnifying-glass along, and when she will see you, put her to the test."

"When she will see me? What do you mean?" asked Mrs. Barry quickly.

"Well"—Ben shrugged his shoulders—"we'll see. How much she was hurt, how long it will last, I don't know, of course. You can try."

"Try!" repeated the queen of Keefe, her handsome face coloring faintly above her white silken gown.

"Yes. Miss Upton will be a good go-between, when she is placated. You saw the partisan in her."

Of course, it was all very absurd, as Mrs. Barry told herself when they arose from the table; but there was no denying that her throne was tottering. Her boy was no longer all hers. Bitter, bitter discovery for most mothers to make even when the rival is not Miss Nobody from Nowhere.

The next morning betimes Ben presented himself at the Emporium. He drove up in his roadster and rushed in upon Miss Upton with an arm full of apple blossoms.

"How is she?" he inquired eagerly.

"Hush, hush! I think she's goin' to sleep again. She's had her breakfast."

"Mother sent her these," he went on, laying the fragrant mass on the counter behind which Miss Mehitable was piling up goods for packing.

She looked at him and the corners of her mouth drew down. "Ben Barry, what do you want to tell such a lie for?"

"Because I think it sounds nice," he returned, unabashed. "Really, I think she would if she dared, you know. We had it out last night. Now what are you going to do about Miss Melody's clothes?"

"Yes, what am I?" said Miss Upton. "Say, Ben"—she gave his arm a push and lowered her voice—"what do you s'pose Charlotte's doin'? She's out in the shed washin' and ironin' Geraldine's clothes." She lifted her plump shoulders and nudged Ben again. They both laughed.

"Good for Lottie!" remarked Ben.

"Oh, she's in love, just in love," said Miss Mehitable. "It's too funny to see her. She wants to wait on the child by inches; but clothes—Ben! You should have seen Geraldine in my—a—my—a wrapper last night!" Miss Mehitable gave vent to another stifled chuckle. "She was just lost in it, and we had to hunt for her and fish her out and put her into something of Charlotte's. Charlotte was tickled to death." Again the speaker's cushiony fist gave Ben's arm an emphatic nudge.

He smiled sympathetically. "I suppose so," he said; "but aren't you going to town to-day to buy her some things?"

"What with?" Miss Upton grew sober and extended both hands palms upward. "I've been thinkin' about it while I was workin' here. She's got to have clothes. I shouldn't wonder if some o' my customers had things they could let us have. Once your mother would 'a' been my first thought."

"Hand-me-downs?" said Ben, flushing. "Nothing doing. Surely you have credit at the stores."

"Yes, I have, but it's my habit to pay my bills," was the defiant reply, "and that girl needs everything. I can't buy 'em all."

Ben patted her arm. "Don't speak so loud, you'll wake the baby. You buy the things, Mehit. I'll see that they're paid for."

"How your mother'd love that!"

"My mother will have nothing to do with it."

"Why, you ain't even self-supportin' yet," declared Miss Upton bluntly. "'T ain't anything to your discredit, of course; you ain't ready," she added kindly.

Ben's steady eyes kept on looking into hers and his low voice replied: "My father died suddenly, you remember. He had destroyed one will and not yet made another. I have money of my own, quite a lot of it, to tell the truth. Now if you'd just let me fly you over to town—"

Miss Mehitable started. "Fly me over, you lunatic!"

"Well, let us go in the train, then. I'll go with you. I know in a general way just what she ought to wear. Soft silky things and a—a droopy hat."

"Ben Barry, you've taken leave o' your senses. Don't you know that everything I get her, that poor child will want to pay for—work, and earn the money? If I buy anything for her, it's goin' to be somethin' she can pay for before she's ninety."

Ben sighed. "All right, Mehit! have it your own way, only get a move. I can't take her out till she gets a hat."

"You haven't got to take her out," retorted Miss Upton decidedly. "She don't want to go out with you. It was only last night she was sayin' she wished she might never see you again."

"Huh!" ejaculated Ben. "Poor girl, I'm sorry for her, then. She is going to stumble over me every time she turns around. She is going to see me till she cries for mercy."

He smiled into Miss Upton's doubtful, questioning face for a silent space.

"Don't worry about that," he said at last. "Just go upstairs and put on your duds, like the dear thing you are, and get the next train." The speaker looked at his watch. "You can catch it all right."

"I never heard o' such a thing," said Miss Mehitable. She had made her semi-annual trip to the city. The idea of going back again with no preparation was startling—and also expensive.

Ben perceived that if there were to be any initiative here he would have to furnish it.

"You don't expect to open the shop again until you have moved, do you?"

"No," admitted Miss Upton reluctantly.

"Then you can take your time. Take these flowers upstairs, ask her what size things she wears, and hurry up and catch the train."

Miss Upton brought her gaze back from its far-away look and she appeared to come to herself. "Look here, Ben Barry, I'm not goin' to be crazy just because you are. Her clean clothes'll be all ready for her by night. I can buy her a sailor hat right here in the village and maybe a jacket. She's got to go to town with me. The idea of buyin' a lot of clothes and maybe not havin' 'em right."

"You're perfectly correct, Miss Upton."

The young man took out his pocket-book and handed his companion a bill. "This is for your fares," he said.

Miss Mehitable's troubled brow cleared even while she blushed, seeing that he had read her thoughts.

"I don't know as this is exactly proper, Ben," she said doubtfully.

"Take my word for it, it is," he replied. "Let me be your conscience for a few weeks. I may not see you for a day or two. I have another little job of kidnapping on hand; so I put you on your honor to do your part."

He was gone, and Miss Upton, placing the sturdy stems of the apple blossoms in a pitcher of water, carried them upstairs. She tiptoed into the room where Geraldine was in bed, but the girl was awake and gave an exclamation of delight.

"Have you an apple tree, too?" she asked.

"No, Mr. Barry brought these over."

The girl's face sobered as she buried it in the blooms Miss Upton offered. Miss Mehitable looked admiringly at the golden braids hanging over the pillows.

"Do you feel rested?" she asked.

"Perfectly, and I know I have taken your bed. To-night we will make me a nice nest on the floor."

Miss Upton smiled. "Oh, I've got a cot. We'll do all right. Do you s'pose there is any way we could get your clothes from that fiend on the farm?" she added.

Geraldine shrank and shook her head. "I wouldn't dare try," she replied.

"Then you and I've got to go to town to-morrow," said Miss Upton, "and get you something."

The girl returned her look seriously and caught her lip under her teeth for a silent space.

"Yes, I know what you're thinkin'," said Miss Mehitable cheerfully; "but the queerest thing and the nicest thing happened to me this mornin'. I got some money that I didn't expect. Just in the nick o' time, you see. We can go to town and—"

Geraldine reached up a hand and took that of her friend, her face growing eager.

"How splendid!" she exclaimed. "Then we will go and get me the very simplest things I can get along with and we'll keep account of every cent and I will pay it all back to you. Do you know I think this bed of yours is full of courage? At any rate, when I waked up this morning I found all my hopefulness had come back. I feel that I am going to make my living and not be a burden on anyone. It's wonderful to feel that way!"

"Of course you are, child." Miss Upton patted the hand that grasped hers. "But first off, you'll have to help me move. I've got a lot o' packin' to do, you understand. I'm movin' my shop to Keefeport. I always do summers."

For answer Geraldine, who had been leaning on her elbow, sat up quickly, evidently with every intention of rising.

"Get back there," laughed Miss Mehitable. "Your clothes ain't ironed yet. I'll move the apple blossoms up side of you—"

"Don't, please," said Geraldine, as she lay down reluctantly. "I think I'd rather they would keep their distance—like their owner."

"Now, child," said Miss Mehitable coaxingly. "Mrs. Barry's one o' the grandest women in the world. I felt pretty hot myself yesterday—I might as well own it—but that'll all smooth over. She didn't mean a thing except that she was surprised."

"We can't blame her for that," returned Geraldine, "but—but—I'm sorry he brought the flowers. I wonder if you couldn't make him understand—very kindly, you know, Miss Upton, that I want to be—just to be forgotten."

Miss Upton pursed her lips and her eyes laughed down into the earnest face. "I'm afraid, child, I don't know any language that could make him understand that."

Geraldine did not smile. She felt that in those intense hours of yesterday, freed from every convention of earth, they two had lived a lifetime. She would rather dwell on its memory henceforth than run the risk of any more shocks. Peace and forgetfulness. That is what she felt she needed from now on.

"He said he was goin' on another kidnappin' errand now," remarked Miss Upton.

The girl looked up quickly from her introspection. A startled look sprang into her eyes and she sat up in bed.

"Oh, Miss Upton, you know him!" she exclaimed, gazing at her friend. "Does he keep solemn promises?"

"I'm sure he does, child. What's the matter now?"

"He promised me—oh, he promised me, he wouldn't go back to that farm alone." The girl's eyes filled with tears that overflowed on her suddenly pale cheeks.

Miss Mehitable sat down on the edge of the bed and patted her, while Geraldine wiped the drops away with the long sleeve of Charlotte's unbleached nightgown. "Then he won't, dear, don't you worry," she said comfortingly. "Where's that courage you were talkin' about just now?"

"That was for myself," said the girl grievously, accepting the handkerchief Miss Upton gave her.

"Who else does he want out o' that God-forsaken place?" asked Miss Upton impatiently. "I wish to goodness that boy could stay put somewhere."

"It's a servant, a dwarf, a poor little friendless boy who was kind to me there. If it hadn't been for him I shouldn't be here now. I should be dying—there! Mr. Barry is going to get him and bring him away. Oh, why didn't I prevent him!" Geraldine broke down completely, weeping broken-heartedly into the handkerchief.

Miss Upton smiled over her head. She knew nothing of Rufus Carder's shot-gun, and she was thinking of Geraldine's earnest request that Ben Barry should forget her.

"Now, stop that right away, my child," she said, enjoying herself hugely. She had seen Ben Barry's heart in his eyes as he came walking under the apple blossoms yesterday and this revelation of Geraldine's was most pleasing.

"Stop cryin'," she said with authority. "Ben Barry's just as smart as he is brave. He ain't goin' to take any foolish risk now that you're safe. I don't know what he wants the boy for, but probably it's some good reason; and if you don't stop workin' yourself up, you won't be fit to go to town to-morrow. I want you should stay in bed all day. Now, you behave yourself, my lamb. Ben'll come back all right."

Geraldine flushed through her tears. It was heavenly to be scolded by someone who loved her.

She looked at the pitcher exiled to the bureau. "I—I think you might as well move the apple blossoms here," she said, wiping her eyes and speaking meekly.

"All right," said Miss Mehitable, beaming, and she proceeded to set a light stand beside the bed and placed the rosy mass upon it.

Toward night came a parcel-post package for Miss Geraldine Melody. Miss Upton and Charlotte both stood by with eager interest while the girl sat up in bed and opened it. None of the three had ever seen such a box of bon-bons as was disclosed. It was a revelation of dainty richness, and the older women exclaimed while Geraldine bowed her fair head over this new evidence of thoughtfulness. The long sleeves of Charlotte's nightgown, the patchwork quilt of the bed, the homely surroundings, all made the contrast of the gift more striking. There was a card upon it. Ben Barry's card: Geraldine turned it over and read: "Is the princess happy?"

She was back among the clouds, the bright spring air flowing past her, each breath a wonderful memory.

The two women looked at one another. They saw her close her hand on the card. She lifted the box to them, and raised her pensive eyes.

"It is for us all," she said softly; but her ardent thought was repeating:

"He would—he will take care of himself, for me!"