Marguerite Crawford felt that she had been truly changed to some other personality when the carriage stopped under the broad porte cochere, and the driver opened the door with a bow for his master. There had been a slight fall of snow in the night that had wrapped every post and every tree in a mantle of jewels, and now the sun came out gorgeously, sending golden rays over the dappled sky of blue and white.

Her father handed her out. Willard ran down the wide steps taking both her hands in his and kissing her fondly. A passion of regret flooded her.

“Oh,” in a broken tone. “I was rude and ungenerous to you yesterday. I am sorry—”

“We will let that go, I knew you would regret it. I tried to look at it from your point of view, and I think you couldn’t resemble mother so much in looks and not in character.”

Her father took her other arm. “Welcome home, my dear daughter,” he exclaimed. “All our years together will prove how glad we are to have you.”The hall was like a beautiful larger room, with pictures and statuary and some elegant vases that would have dwarfed a smaller space.

“This is my sister, Miss Crawford—Aunt Kate, to you always; who has been like a mother to my children—”

Aunt Kate bent over from her tallness and gave her a perfunctory kiss. Zay clasped both arms around her.

“Oh, isn’t it queer,” with a musical ripple. “You certainly were a princess in disguise at school, and some of the girls said you were my double to tease me; but I don’t think we look very much alike; do you, papa?”

She raised her radiant face with the pearly complexion, bewitching mouth and shining eyes. Marguerite looked rather pale and cold with the strangeness.

Then they went up to the mother’s room, but Aunt Kate paused at the door and turned in another direction. Zay and Willard followed her. Marguerite went to her mother’s arms and for many seconds neither spoke.

“What a strange, long waiting without any hope,” said the father at length. “I have often thought what Marguerite would be like if she had lived, and it always was impressed upon me that she would be like her mother. If I could have wished it—”

The child raised her head. The dark lashes were beaded with tears.

“I am sorry not to be as beautiful,” she said, with great humility. “I must make up any deficiency by my love and devotion. Oh, it seems as if I had gone into some divine country when love filled the very atmosphere.”

She held out her hand to her father who crushed it in a tender clasp.

“But you are looking pale and weary, mother.” What a sweet word it was to say when it was true.

“I have had a great deal of excitement these last few days, then the nurse had to go away to a more serious case, but I have tried to obey her injunctions,” smiling a little. “Probably I shall never be very robust again, but nothing like this will try nerves. I think I have stood it exceedingly well,” glancing up at her husband. “I was very quiet all day yesterday, but I could not help dreaming of the years to come——”

“I hope God will give me strength to make them happy. Oh, I want to give you the best of love and service and never pain you by any lack. For you are the mother I have longed for, who could capture and fill my desires. I would like to work for you——”

“My dear, if you could be so devoted to the mother who was not your ideal and could not understand your thoughts and feelings, I shall try to come nearer and fill your whole heart, sympathize with your aspirations. I shall be glad to listen to them. Oh, my child, if you had been dull and coarse, but you simply could not have been, and this Mrs. Boyd must have had a certain refinement. I appreciate her more every day as I think it over.”

“Oh, I thank you for that. It seems to me that I must have been willful at times; but I wanted to take her out of that narrow round as well as myself. I felt so certain I could do it after we came to Mrs. Barrington’s. She understood my aims.”

“You fell into good hands. Oh, how many times we shall talk this over, for I want to know all the incidents of these years we have been apart. When I have lived them with you, I shall feel more truly still that I am your mother. And now are you not a little curious about your new home?”

Mrs. Crawford rose with her arm about the girl, and Marguerite glanced about the room. It was exquisitely appointed. The second story rooms were ranged about an oval that gave a picturesque aspect. This and the sleeping rooms were toward the east; Mrs. Crawford had a passion for sunrise. On one side was Zay’s room, adjoining it Aunt Kate’s. Opposite, two guest rooms with bath and closets. It all seemed like some lovely description she had read of in books. Her girl’s heart and the refined tastes that had been her birthright seemed to leap for joy. Was she really to live amid all this loveliness!

“We talked of your room on Friday. We couldn’t take Zay away from Aunt Kate to put you two together. Willard had this room next to my sitting room, when he came home on vacations; sometimes, both boys; they are very fond of each other. So he proposed his should be yours and had everything taken out and the walls tinted afresh. But we couldn’t order new furniture at once, so we brought this from one of the guest chambers. Some day you may choose for yourself. He took out the real boys’ pictures except ‘Night and Morning’ which are great favorites of his and his two bookcases. In one he has left all his poets; at heart, he is a rather romantic fellow. And the other you must fill up to your liking.”“Oh, how could he be so kind to me, when—” and Marguerite swallowed over a great sob.

“He is so glad for me. And he thinks it is truly a gift of Providence that you should come, now that he is going away. Three years! Yet I have waited so many years for these great blessings; prayed for them, if one’s ardent wish is a prayer.”

“Did you ever pray for me?” asked Marguerite in a low awed tone.

“I prayed that if I died I should find you in that beautiful other country. And sometimes I almost believed I should find you here. Invalids have curious fancies almost like visions. Perhaps God gave me the hope to enable me to endure the suffering and to be comparatively well again and to have you—”

There was the summons to luncheon. The Major came for his wife, Willard met his sister in the hall. The dining room was perfectly appointed, with stands of flowers and ferns that made almost a garden of it. A few blossoms were laid beside each one’s plate. The butler seated them noiselessly. Aunt Kate was at the head of the table; she had kept the place so long that Mrs. Crawford would not hear of any change. She sat at the right of her husband, Marguerite at the left; Jay and Willard were opposite.

Marguerite was nervous, but she did just as the others. She felt that Aunt Kate’s sharp eyes were upon her. Nearly always, she and her mother had taken their meals together; on Sunday, specially invited to dine with Mrs. Barrington and Miss Arran. Mrs. Boyd shrank from these occasions but the girl seemed guiding her with an almost imperceptible grace.

And although the luncheon came in courses it was not ornate. Marguerite began to feel quite at ease. There was some bright talk, but she did not join that, only now and then answering when her father appealed to her. But every moment she felt more at home.

When they rose Willard took her arm.

“You must examine your new home,” he began, laughingly. “If you shouldn’t like it—”

“I’d deserve to be banished to Laconia and live in an atmosphere of soot and dust and all manner of noises,” she answered, brightly.

“This is the drawing room. In my grandmother’s time they used to have famous gatherings. Uncle Reginald was a great society man, and Aunt Kate quite a belle, but the Madam as she was called, spent her money lavishly. That was in her own right. Much of this furniture came from abroad. But I will do her the justice to say that she did not despise the old Crawford heirlooms that were handsome. Some of them are two centuries old, when people loved to carve and ornament and never compared their time with money. Uncle Reginald was very handsome in his early days and her favorite. Father went to West Point.”

The room was certainly full of choice belongings. At the end, a full length portrait of Madame Crawford, painted by a famous French artist during one of her visits to Paris. The satin and velvet of her gown looked real and her laces were magnificently done. She was handsome and set them off beautifully. A string of sapphires encircled her throat and from it depended three pendants of diamonds so skilfully done that in certain lights they emitted rays. A handsome woman, truly, but proud and haughty.

“She only wanted one son so that the Crawford estate need not be divided. She was not in favor of large families, while father would have been glad of at least half a dozen. So you may judge how delighted he is to have you. This is the library. There is a small fortune in the books. Great-grandfather Crawford was an eager collector. Father has been offered big prices for some of the rare editions.”

At the farther end of the library there were wide glass doors that opened into a conservatory, where the choicest flowers were kept, and curious ferns. Just beyond was the propagating room and where the tired-out bloomers were put for recuperation.

Marguerite was speechless with admiration. She glanced up with a lovely smile and her dark eyes were lustrous. “Oh,” she murmured, with a long sigh, “I never saw anything so lovely! And that I should have come here to live—”

“Our next door neighbors have quite as much beauty, only it is rather more modern. But their conservatory is magnificent. Such a show of orchids is unusual. But Mount Morris is a rather aristocratic place, that is not wholly given over to fashion, but where people have lovely things to enjoy and are not trying to distance each other unless it is in the matter of choice flowers,” and he laughed. “Mother is so fond of them.”

She thought she could linger there all the remainder of the day, but presently Willard turned and they retraced their steps. Major Crawford stood in the hall.

“Shall we go for our walk, Willard?” he asked. “I think mother would like Marguerite.”

She made a pretty inclination of the head and went up stairs feeling as if she was in fairyland. Mrs. Crawford lay on the lounge with a beautiful Persian wrap thrown over her.

“Will you come and read to me?” she asked in a winsome tone. “I want to hear your voice in poetry; Mrs. Barrington said you were a fine reader. I hope you love verse. The dainty little ones are a great pleasure to me, fugitive verses, as they are called. They have soothed many a painful hour.”

“Are you very tired?” Marguerite bent over and kissed her.

“No, my dear, only this is part of my German doctor’s regimen. He sent a nurse home with me, and last week she went back to assist him with a peculiar case; and I have certain directions to follow, which I obey, implicitly. One is to take a rest after luncheon. Then, I like to be read to. I am something of a spoiled child, you see.”

“I shall be glad to go on with the spoiling,” the girl said in a sweet, earnest tone. “I want to do all I can to make you happy—to make up for the years when you did not have me.”

Marguerite’s eyes were lustrous with deep feeling. Her words went to the mother’s heart.

“Let me see—find ‘In Memoriam.’ How many times in the last few days I have said over to myself:

“If one should bring me this report
That thou hads’t touched the land today,
And I went down unto the quay,
And found thee lying in the port,”

Marguerite took the beautifully bound volume in her hand and it gave her a thrill.

“Some poems are adapted to this or that one’s voice, like songs. The Major reads Browning and that is saved especially for him. Willard loves Stevenson and Eugene Field’s children’s verses. Zaidee the light gay caroling things, and those arch, sweet Irish poems. But your voice sounded to me as if you loved Tennyson and Whittier.”“I have not had the opportunity of reading Tennyson very much, but I thought the Christmas verses most beautiful. I hope I shall please you,” hesitatingly.

Mrs. Crawford listened attentively. There was a depth and richness in the voice, an impressive, penetrating emotion that betrayed the harmony with the lines. And when she had finished that poem, she said in a low tone:

“Shall I go on?”

“Yes,” replied the mother.

It was so beautiful that Marguerite forgot herself in the poet’s deep feeling—so human, so comforting—she could have read on until dusk, but Mrs. Crawford turned presently.

“I must not tire you for I shall want you to read to me often. Do you sing? I suppose you have not begun to play?”

“No, Mrs. Barrington thought I would, in the new term. And she also thought my voice was—” Marguerite paused, afraid of being too presuming.

“Worth cultivating, was not that what she said? It is a contralto that can express profound depths of feeling. I had it years ago and your father was wild over it. He will be delighted. Zay’s voice is a light soprano. She plays very well. Yes, you must take up music.”“Oh, mother, it doesn’t seem as if so many lovely things should come to me!”

“Why not, when you have been in the desert all these years?”

They clasped each other in a fond embrace. Oh, was it really true that she was a daughter of the house, that she had a right to the love and care? Could she ever give enough to repay?

There was a stir down stairs and some merry voices. Major Crawford rejoined his wife presently.

“The two Chichester girls to see if the children are sure to go to the Van Ordens, though I think their eagerness is most for Will,” laughing. “His gay time will soon be over. Zay’s as well. Next week school will begin, and Marguerite must come under rules. The chief one is that there is no frollicking until Friday evening, no holiday until Saturday.”

“Oh, I wish girls did not have to grow up so fast. Think how soon they will be sixteen,” bemoaned the mother.

“I kept another birthday,” said Marguerite. “I am glad to go back even the few months.”

“You look as if you were beginning to feel at home,” said her father. “Oh, I hope we shall have many, many happy years together.”

Marguerite’s heart was too full to reply. She looked at him with eyes like her mother’s, only they were a little deeper.

Zay came flying up stairs.

“Have I neglected you all the afternoon? We found a bad rent in my pretty frock and Aunt Kate had to change the skirt. Then I wanted to write some letters and the days are so short.”

She kissed her mother rapturously; then went and sat on her father’s knee.

“And the Chichesters want us to dinner tomorrow and a little dance afterward. It is Will’s last nibble at pleasure. Oh, why didn’t you make him choose some real business, you naughty father, so he could have stayed at home like a respectable citizen.”

“And had a sweetheart. Then what would you have done?”

“Looked up a sweetheart also. Oh, must he go Wednesday night?”

“Think what a nice long holiday he has had!”

“And think of three desolate years!”

“They may be more desolate for us than for him. But it was his choice.”He entered the room just then. Had Marguerite found any special entertainment? What had Zay been doing?

“Oh, writing letters. Marguerite be glad you have not forty dear friends who are crying write, write all the time.”

No there was only one person she had written to. That was Sally Weeks at Laconia, and if Sally answered—well, she was lame on spelling, if she had a good generous heart.

Zay and her aunt had done something beside writing and mending the party frock. They had discussed Marguerite.

“Well,” Aunt Kate had said with a long and rather unwilling accent, “she might have been worse. Her table manners are passable. I do suppose she has picked up a good deal at Mrs. Barrington’s. But she has a rather uncertain air, and we shall have to hunt her up some clothes. I must talk to your mother about it.”

“Oh, dear, what a fuss there will be at school; I wish it was all over! I do wonder what Louie Howe will say! We had some talks—well, I could see how some of the girls felt.”

“I think that was very natural. I suppose she was presuming.”“No, she wasn’t,” returned Zay with heightened color. “I want to be fair to her for she is my sister. I think I’d rather be an only daughter, but father will be just as fond of me, I am sure. I don’t know about the boys; but then Vincent won’t be home until next summer. I suppose we’ll all go to West Point. Of course, I couldn’t well have stayed with mother this afternoon, so I don’t mind her being there—”

“Zay you are very generous and unsuspecting. I should be sorry to have any influence undermine your love. You have been all to your mother.”

“But I can’t be all now, I see that. Still I’ll have you, aunt Kate, and I won’t give up my place in her heart. Oh, trust me to keep that.”

Aunt Kate was anxious for her favorite and though she did not mean to be ungenerous, she could not so cordially rejoice. If the girl had been awkward or underbred, she could have taken her in hand with a good grace. But she was not likely to ask anything of her.

Dinner was a rather more elaborate meal. It did seen odd to wait for some one to help to the smallest thing and she wondered how Mrs. Boyd would feel to have some one standing at her back and anticipating her wishes before they were hardly formulated. But there was a certain dignity and pleasure in it with no jar or awkwardness. How did she come to take to it naturally? She did not seem to feel embarrassed, and how lovely the room looked with the lights and the still hanging Christmas greens.

When Zaidee came in to wish her mother good-night, she did indeed look like a fairy being. Her frock was some soft, diaphanous stuff over a pale green slip, some of her curls were tied up high on her head and the ribbon and that of her sash matched. Three strings of pearl beads were about her white throat. Marguerite smiled to herself—Miss Nevins would call that very poor party attire.

“Don’t stay late,” Major Crawford said to his son.

“Oh, we couldn’t,” declared Zay laughing. “It’s a school girls’ ‘Small and early.’ We begin at eight and the musicians depart at ten and we go to refreshments, and by eleven,

“‘The lights are fled the music dead,
And all of us departed.’”

“That is just as it should be,” declared aunt Kate, “if you wish to keep roses and bright eyes for pleasure later on.”Zay kissed her parents. Marguerite was sitting a little out of range, but Willard bent over and gave her a tender good-night. Then aunt Kate wrapped her niece in a lovely evening cloak trimmed with white fox and drew the hood up carefully, and the carriage soon whisked them to their destination.

“Oh, how beautiful she looks!” Marguerite exclaimed involuntarily.

The mother smiled tenderly.

“Zaidee has grown up with her beauty,” said the father. “I used to be afraid aunt Kate would spoil her and lead her to think beauty was the great thing to strive for, but she takes it as a matter of course. I hope she will be as indifferent about it when she is grown to womanhood, for nothing destroys the charm like that ultraconsciousness and the bid for admiration. So many things beside beauty of feature go to make up the charm of an interesting woman.”

She must be interesting, Marguerite thought. There were so many delightful qualities one could cultivate. Mrs. Barrington was charming, and Miss Arran had so many nice quiet ways, that she had insensibly copied; her low toned voice, her never seeming to hurry and yet going about any matter as if it was the first thing to be done; her little orderly methods. She kept her mother’s room neat, she put the books back in their places; there was a cluster of autumn leaves in a vase, or a sprig of spruce or cedar that for a long while would put forth new leaves. She was very glad now that she had taken so much pains. Was she rather unpolished when they had first come from Laconia. But her circle there was so different.

She told over only the best of it when her father asked about her life there. Wasn’t this what Willard had meant and she had resented? She would try not to be ashamed of the poor and plain living since it was the best Mrs. Boyd could give; but she knew even then she was longing and planning for something better.

And a room like this for her very own! She liked it better because her very own brother had planned it for her. She looked over some of the books and above his name he had written—“For my Sister Marguerite.” And she was glad with a sense of mystery she did not care to fathom that her mother’s room was between her and Zaidee’s.

What a long day it had been. Yet in a certain sense happy, as happy as any strange beautiful place with a father and mother,—the latter she had not even dreamed of when she had thought a father might be found. Oh, she must be very grateful to God for sending her here where the tangle could be resolved in such an honorable manner and she must try to be worthy of all the love lavished upon her. The whole world broadened and she was part of the higher life. She was looking up to the hill tops where human endeavors must aspire even though there were failures, and to the west over beyond the land of eternal love and golden fruition.