The winter of 1892-93 Mary spent at home with us. Her first expressed wish, when the family returned from Interlaken, was to be confirmed, and the Rev. Mr. Armstrong of the church we do not attend was duly notified.

"He says I must be christened first," said Mary. "Would you mind if he called me 'Mary Gemmell'? There aint any name that I've a right to, and I don't want to be called 'Mason,' because that's the name of the woman that abused me when I was little. I'd rather have yours."

She was such a pathetic-looking young person, standing there before Belle in her fresh and innocent loveliness, that my wife had not the heart to refuse her anything.

When I came home that same evening there was a tableau vivant in front of the parlor fire. Dressed in white, Mary sat on a low stool at the feet of the Rev. Walter Armstrong, her hands clasped in her lap, gazing up into the clean-shaven clerical face, with that which passed for her soul in her eyes. In spite of his stiff round collar and long black coat the rector is a young man, and I saw that he was impressed.

"You understand, do you, Mary," he said tenderly, "that when you are received into the Church you have God for your Father and Christ for your Elder Brother?"

"Yes, I understand, Mr. Armstrong," replied the girl earnestly. "And that's just what I always wanted—was to have 'folks.'"

I retired in haste to the dining room, where Isabel was brimming over with a new scheme.

"I've always found the housekeeping a drag, and it becomes more so every year as my outlook broadens. I want to keep up to the times, but I never have any leisure for reading, and our four eldest being boys, there seemed to be no hope for years of having any one to relieve me."

"Mary's a godsend," said I.

"I wish you really thought that, as I do. She's quick and adaptable, and I'm going to hand over to her a weekly allowance and let her keep the house on it."

"What about her accomplishments—the elocution and the cornet?"

"They can stand in the meantime. Do you know, Davie," hesitatingly, "I'm beginning to be afraid she hasn't a good ear for music."

"Why?"

"The other night when the Mortons were in she sat and talked to Frank Wade the whole time Eva was playing."

"That's nothing. Everyone else did the same."

"But for a girl who is trying to pose as a cornet player, who thinks she might earn her living leading a church choir with one, it's bad policy, to say the least of it."

"Earn her living! I asked Joe Mitchell, when he was listening to her practicing out in the summer-house, what he thought of her playing, and he said she'd better keep to a penny whistle."

"Very rude of him!"

"No, it wasn't. I asked him point blank if I should be justified in paying for the more lessons she wants, and he said decidedly I should not."

"Well," said Belle wearily, "we'll try the housekeeping. That's a woman's true vocation, according to orthodox ideas. I shouldn't have set my heart on Mary turning out to be anything extraordinary. If she'll only be kind of half decent, and help me out with the housework, I'll be more than satisfied."

The sense of power gave new brightness to Mary's fair face, and her step through the house was of the lightest during the next week or two, but the boys rebelled in turn.

"Mamma! Mary's locked the pantry. Must we go to her for the key whenever we want anything?"

"I call it a mean shame!" from Joe.

"What were you doing?"

"We didn't do nothin', on'y eat up the pie she meant for dessert. I'm sure Margaret wouldn't mind makin' another."

"Mary's perfectly right, boys; I've indulged you too much."

Then it was Watty who complained:

"Mary says she won't have us mussing up the parlor after she's tidied it, and that we've got to change our boots when we come into the house." Or Chrissie:

"Mary says I'm big enough now to keep my own room in order, and she aint going to do it any more. She's wors'en grandma!"

To their grandma did they go with their woes when they found their mother so unaccountably obdurate, but they did not get much comfort there. Detest Mary as she might, my poor mother is always loyal to the powers that be, and she told the children:

"Yer mither kens fine what she's aboot, an' ye needna fash yer heids tae come cryin' tae me."

She even went so far as to back Mary up in her suggestion that the boys should eat what was set before them, asking no questions.

"That's the w'y yer faither was brocht up. If he didna finish his parritch in the mornin', they were warmed up for him again at nicht. Ye tak' but a spinfu' 'at ye could hardly ca' parritch, for they're jist puzhioned wi' sugar."

Mary was not naturally fond of children, and, having entered our family full-grown, she found it hard to put up with the freaks of our six, there being no foundation of sisterly love upon which to build toleration.

Belle's housekeeping had always been lavish. She ordered her groceries wholesale, and when they were done never inquired what had become of them.

"I decline to go into details—life is too short! I don't know where my patience ends and my laziness begins, but I'd rather be cheated than lock things up, or try to keep track of what Margaret wastes. She's not an ideal 'general,' but it's only one in a hundred that would stand the children pottering about in the kitchen so much."

After the time-worn custom of new brooms, Mary made a bold attempt to record each item of expenditure, and ordered what she wanted from day to day; but there was no calculating the appetites of four growing boys, especially when, as Mary affirmed, they sometimes over-ate themselves just to spite her.

"We're living from hand to mouth, papa," they would say, when an unwonted scarcity occurred.

Truth to tell, I began to sympathize with my revolting sons when I brought an old friend home with me to dinner one day, and went to announce the fact to our "housekeeper."

"I just wish that Bob Mansell would quit coming here so much when he's not expected. There's only enough pudding for ourselves."

"Mary," said I sternly, "Mr. Mansell's been coming to this house before you were here, and he'll keep on coming after you're gone, if you're not careful."

It was the first time I had ever spoken sharply to her, and I flattered myself that I had done some good, though she held her head high and left the room.

Belle came to the conclusion that the housekeeping scheme did not work smoothly, and she resumed the reins of government. Mary was still supposed to do the work of a second maid, but it was evident that her heart was not in it.

"What does Mary want now?" I asked my wife when she took her usual seat beside me, as I lay on the sofa with my pipe.

"She thinks she'd like to go to the Boston School of Oratory to prepare herself to be a public reader."

"Is it necessary that she should be before the public in one way or another?"

"She doesn't seem to be much of a success in private life."

"In that respect she's no worse than half the girls in town. None of them dote on housework."

"But, considering that this girl has no earthly claim on us, you'd think she might be different."

"Don't be angry, Belle, at my saying so, but you've only yourself to thank for that. You've been most anxious that Mary should be just like one of ourselves—should not feel that she was accepting charity, and you've succeeded only too well. The girl takes everything you do for her as her right, and asks for more."

"Well, what about Boston?"

"I think it would be arrant folly to send her there. How do we know she has any more talent for elocution than for music?"

"She has the desire to learn. I suppose that's a sign of the ability."

"She has an intense desire for admiration, that's about the size of it. To be the center of all eyes, giving a recitation in a drawing room, pleases her down to the ground, but it doesn't follow that she would be a success professionally."

"I dare say we've spent about as much on her education as you care to do just now."

"We have indeed!"

My wife and I are much in demand at all the social functions of our town, and, though I accompany her under protest, I confess that, once the affair is in full swing, I enjoy as much as anybody a hand at "Pedro" or a dance.

The houses of our city are mostly wooden and mostly new, for an annual conflagration keeps building brisk. Hardwood floors and mantels are the order of the day, and if some of our lumbermen and their wives have not a command of English grammar in keeping with their horses, their sealskins, and their diamonds, they have a heartier than an English welcome—except, of course, for guests of such questionable antecedents as our Mary.

Mrs. David Gemmell is a bright and witty woman, though I say it, who should not. But why should I not? She did not inherit her wits from me. Mrs. David Gemmell let the leading ladies of the town understand that unless Mary was invited to everything that was going on, we stayed away ourselves. Lake City society could not proceed without Isabel, so the "white elephant" was received in her train, and truly she did us credit in company, if nowhere else. She was always stylishly dressed, and her dancing was a joy forever. We did not marvel when Will Axworthy, the most eligible young man about, took it into his head to introduce the german to our benighted citizens, that he chose Mary for his partner to lead it with him. She had private lessons from himself, as well as from the dancing master, and proud and happy were Belle and I to sit at the side of the ballroom and watch her going through the figures and bestowing her favors with all the grace and dignity of one of the four hundred.

"She shall go to Boston to-morrow, if she wants to," said I, but this time Belle demurred.

"I think she seems likely to have a good time here this winter, and we may as well let her have her fling."

The prophecy was fulfilled. In spite of the supreme jealousy of the other girls, who could not say mean enough things about her, Mary became quite the rage with the young men.

One Sunday afternoon Will Axworthy called. He is short and broad, has reddish hair and a chronic blush hardly to be looked for in the Ward McAllister of Lake City. Too nervously did he plant himself in my frisky spring rocker, and therefore involuntarily did he present the soles of his boots to the assembled family, while his head bumped the wall, to the huge delight of our boys!

Undaunted by that inauspicious beginning, he came again the next Sunday, smoked my best cigars, and talked lumber, the one subject upon which he is posted, for he was the manager of a mill here.

He stayed to supper that evening and went with Mary to church afterward. Then he called for her with a cutter the first bright day, and took her sleigh riding. The embryo wrinkle left Belle's forehead.

"Do you really think he means anything?" said she.

"Don't be too sanguine about it. Nowadays, young men pay a girl a great deal of attention with nothing in their heads but a good time."

"Still, Axworthy's no boy. He's thirty if he's a day, and he has a good salary, and can afford to marry whenever the mood takes him."

"Let us hope and pray that it may take him soon!"

"Amen!" said Belle solemnly.

The daily friction with her protÉgÉe was becoming too much for the good-natured patience even of my better half. Acting upon generous impulses is all very fine, but they need to be backed up by a large amount of endurance and tolerance if the results are to be successfully dealt with.

From my vantage-ground on the nursery sofa, behind my screen of newspaper, I frequently hear more than is suspected by the family.

"Mary, you're not going to the rink to-night!" in Belle's most imploring tone.

"Yes, mawm, I am. Lend me your wrench, Watty."

"Mary, I positively forbid you to go to the rink!"

"Well, I do think that's just too mean for anything. Every girl in town goes."

"Every girl in town doesn't skate with barber, or bandsman, or anybody who comes along, as you do."

"Watty's been telling!"

"Watty hasn't been telling!" broke in our eldest son in indignant protest, which he further emphasized by going out and banging the door after him.

"And, Mary," Belle continued, "are you engaged to Mr. Axworthy?"

"No!" sullenly.

"Then if I were you I wouldn't let him kiss me when he says 'Good-night' at the door after bringing you home from a party."

"You're old-fashioned. All the girls do it!"

"No lady would permit a man to take such a liberty. You're spoiling your chances with Mr. Axworthy, I can tell you. I never knew a man yet that would bind himself to a girl when he could have all the privileges of an engaged man, and none of the responsibilities."

"I don't care anything at all about him. I don't want to marry him. He's just giving me a good time."

A good time he undoubtedly did give her throughout the winter. To the smartest balls and parties he was her escort, and she always wore the roses he never neglected to send. Every Sunday about dusk he would come round to our house, and, martyrs to a good cause, Isabel, mother, and I vacated the cozy parlor with its easy chairs and blazing fire for the nursery—always uproarious with children on that day.

"I wonder what those two find to talk about," speculated Belle. "Mary has no conversation at all, and Axworthy hasn't much more."

"Perhaps he takes it out in looking at her. By the way, Belle, when are you going to appear in the new dress I gave you that fifty dollars to buy? I am quite tired of the mauve tea gown."

My wife glanced over her shoulder to make sure that Grandma was out of hearing.

"The truth is, Dave, I thought I must wait to see how much of it I had left after getting Mary rigged up for the Robinsons' dance. She goes out so often that she needs a change of evening dress."

"Did she ask for it?"

"Not directly, but she remarked that she didn't see what I wanted with a new black silk, that I had plenty of clothes, and that when she was my age she didn't think she'd bother about what she had to wear."

I sprang up from the sofa, prepared to shove Mary out of the house, neck and crop, but Belle's outburst of laughter calmed me.

"Her cheek is so great that it passes from the ridiculous to the sublime!"

"Why do you stand it, Belle? You wouldn't from anybody else."

"I can't very well go back on her at this stage, and send her about her business. She's shrewd enough to know that."

"People would laugh; that's so!"

"Besides, if she marries Axworthy, she'll be our social equal here in this town, and it must never be in her power to say that we did not treat her well."

"What is the prospect with Axworthy?"

"Good, I think. He is thoroughly kind to her, and he has given me plenty of hints about the state of his affections, hopes by another winter that Mary will have somebody else to look after her, and so on. He is always most particular in seeing that she is well wrapped up, and that is highly necessary, for she is extremely careless about how she goes out. In spite of a certain amount of physical dash, she isn't a bit strong; has no staying power."

"It won't be much fun for Axworthy to be saddled with a delicate wife."

"Well, I guess he needs some discipline, just as much as I do. I've had my share out of Miss Mary for the last three years, and I am quite willing to let somebody else have a turn. He walks into this thing with his eyes open. He knows her history."

"But does he know her disposition?"

"Let him find that out—if he can. Most mothers don't think it necessary to tell their daughters' suitors how the girls get on with them in the house."

"You say she has no constitution. Supposing he does marry her, how about the possible children? What have they done that they should have Mary for a mother?"

"That's exactly the right way to put it—what have they done? We don't know, but they must have gone far astray last time, if they are given such a bad start this incarnation."

Will Axworthy left town in the spring. Lumber was done in our part of Michigan and he had to follow it further south. He and Mary corresponded, for I caught Belle in the act of correcting one of her letters.

"Do you think that's quite fair to Axworthy? If they become engaged, the first unedited letter he gets from Mary will be considerable of a surprise to him."

"Don't you bother your old head, Dave! I'm running this thing! He's arranging to meet us in Chicago, and hopes to have the pleasure of showing Mary the Columbian Exhibition. Something is sure to happen while we're there!"