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T sound of his daughter's coming, Josiah Markham hastilypocketed a new ring which he had been admiring, and fell to polishing his spectacles. Lifting a placid look of vague nearsightedness to Anne's face, he distinguished only a pleasing blend of colors.

"I'm sorry to be late, father, but

Her voice hung undecided upon the last word, leaving explanation to the fancy of the listener.

"It don't matter, child, if you ain't overheated yourself hurrying."

Through the lustrous lenses Josiah saw a brightly flushed face, past its earliest youth, but bearing the arrested bloom of a girl reluctant to pass on to sober womanhood. At her father's words, Anne pressed her hot cheeks, and he noted the young shine of her eyes.

"Anne, you look mighty like your mother when we were courting!"

Again the glasses were absently rubbed, while back from the mists of the years reminiscence brought clearly to view another face, though the woman at his side was dim.

A pleasant lingering of tone loitered through the words, but Josiah was jerked back into the present by the tightening of Anne's arms about him. The girl knelt beside his chair, misreading his dreamy revery, a rush of excited speech appealing to him through her mother's accents:

"I know how you must ache for her, father, but we'll never forget her, you and I, never! You couldn't give your name and heart to another, or I turn to a new home, leaving you to fight it out alone, could we, father?"

Josiah tried to readjust his glasses before speaking, but Anne captured his

hands, stroking them with quick little motions, while looking up through her tears, she saw a little better than her father, whose face reddened like a winter apple, sun-kissed. The young-old man cleared his throat and forcefully freeing one hand, placed his glasses out of harm's way on the table at his elbow. But before he could speak, the daughter crowded closer, snuggling her face between her father's arm and the smooth coolness of the leather chair, her words coming with muffled earnestness:

"I've done the best I could for you, daddy, haven't I? And I shall to the end, but oh! it would break my heart if you ever married again, and you know I shall never

Anne- !"

"No, daddy, please wait! Say after me, just for fun, the childish pledge I made you take when old Mrs. Smith gossiped about you and widow Melville. You know it goes like this, 'Anne, I will never marry again, cross my heart!' - And I'll say, 'Father, I'll never marry at all while

Her chin was tilted up and lips closed by his hand.

Stop!

That's all wrong. You are

no longer a foolish little girl to be pacified by some rigmarole, but a young woman, with her life unlived and all before. I refuse to be towed around any longer like a useless wreck, by my energetic tug of a daughter, for I want her to make a cruise of her own in matrimonial waters. I reckon you'll think it the conceit of second childhood, Anne, but I'm not quite out of commission yet, and flatter myself that I'm still young enough to steer a straight course unaided. girl, man never had a better daughter, but you've done enough and I want you to open your heart to the coming of some

My

strong, manly fellow, who will love and care for you when I am gone. Mother would want us to be happy, wouldn't she, child?”

Anne's answer trembled mutely through her. Josiah caressed the bowed head in silence, pondering this passion of sacrificial devotion in one so young, when his old heart was turning to the sunshine of a new love after the withering loneliness of years, made solemn by religious zeal for remembrance, of which Anne was the vestal virgin.

"Let's just be happy in a natural way, Anne, recalling mother with smiles as well as with tears. Didn't you ever have a sweetheart, child?" A frank suspicion lighted his thoughtful expression. "But perhaps that's where the shoe pinches, you little old woman before your time! People often rush to sign the pledge when they feel the big thirst on! "

Hopeful humor glinted up at her, as Anne sprang to her feet, a prey to a war of colors, her heart beating in her throat in choking protest against his playful attack. A voice, victor and vanquished by turns, replied, "Have I deserved this? Have I ever encouraged any callers except the girls? Didn't I have to bear the name of 'old maid' even in my teens? Oh! it hurts to have you doubt my loyalty to you and to mother and to our compact! Of course your life lies buried with her and you can't deceive me with your scheming for what you fancy my happiness. Why, you dear old dad, I wouldn't be released from our compact any more than you would! My happiness is found in duty well done, and you may be sure that you can count on me as long- " her voice broke, a gentle hand seeking rest on his gray head, with its fresh-colored, perplexed face"as long as you need me!"

Turning away with quickened breathing, Anne did not see her father's mouth agape, disclosing unsuspected years and

would make me a sight happier'n any lookin' after to see you some like other girls! Why can't you have your singin', courtin', and nestin' fime like your kind, stid of eternally chantin' dirges and roostin' in the past!"

Josiah advanced on her excitedly, feeling a doughty exhilaration as he tasted his worded thought at last, his gentle nature thoroughly intoxicated with revolt.

"Don't you reckon I'd like to have some grandchildren, like other men of my age?"

He glared at Anne with all the ferociousness of a cornered sheep, into whose belligerent eyes a softening mirth was creeping.

"O father!"

The astonished man found himself strangled for a heart beat as he peered at a radiant blur which faded behind a banged door, just as his groping fingers closed on the elusive glasses.

"It's an absurdity, of course, at our time of life, Marthy, but we've got to elope!"

Miss Martha Leland chuckled comfortably, the firm plumpness of her flesh creasing.

"Won't daughter give us her blessing?"

Fun blurred her utterance, rejuvenating the wholesome, middle-aged face. Josiah worked up a shame-faced grin.

"Do you reckon I'd reverse the order of nature and ask permission of my own child, even if it is the modern way to put a man on the shelf at forty and call in the youngsters to run things?"

The prospective bride sobered with suspicious alacrity:

Then why not tell her the day is set, and ask Anne to be bridesmaid? I'm to be married on the twenty-ninth! If fifteen years couldn't soften her to the thought of your being happy with some one else, there's no use in our sneaking around this way any longer, like we was ashamed of each other!

Josiah, a composite of pleasure and pained perplexity, studied the enforced seriousness of Martha's face, finding it

very live and changeful. 'Good! After the twenty-ninth we won't wander about like ancient babes in the woods, but just go openly home. But, Marthy, it ain't so all-fired easy as it sounds, to shout that message up to the heights of selfabnegation and martyrdom, where Anne stands like a signpost, one hand pointed loyally to the past and the other directin' my totterin' steps along the single file way I should take to the grave."

The woman's lips smiled, but tenderness lurked in the corners, as boldly settling herself nearer to Josiah on the park bench, she ejaculated, "You dear old henpecked boy! I'll tell her, if you like. A woman always likes to tell of her engagement, you know."

Josiah straightened, shaking his head with vigor, as mentally he pictured the scene between the two women. Sliding an arm along the back of the bench he gave her as near an approach to a caress as the publicity of the spot would permit. Dreading telltale tongues, these two usually met in some park, or as by chance, in library or church, seeking by a variety of innocent artfulness to evade Anne's vigilance. The man spoke with dignity: You needn't think, Marthy, that even Anne could separate me from you! But I hate a row more than any one on earth, I reckon. Now, my idea is that when a thing is done, words can't change it, and soon die out. Ain't the easiest way to do a thing, just to do it and then tell? His arm pressed against her along the bench.

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And least said soonest mended!'" quoted Martha, in non-committal tone, leaning hard against his elongated embrace while watching with absent interest the strolling approach of two figures across the grass. Josiah, absorbed in the arguments he was bringing to bear, saw only Martha, as with the close scrutiny of imperfect vision he leaned toward her eagerly:

"You wouldn't want the fuss and feathers of a flare-out wedding, anyhow, would you, Marthy, at our time of life?"

A faint flame found its way up to her brow from the burning rebellion of Martha's long-suffering heart, which had meekly allowed every feminine desire

for the sweet, yet half-revealed mystery of courtship to be quenched by the cold water of Anne's threatened displeasure or superior censure.

"Maybe not, Josiah Markham! But you'll please to remember that you've had your cake, icing and all, and are even taking a second helping before I've had any. Besides, we ain't at the same time of life, and this being my first wedding I'm free to say I'd think white the prettiest even if I was old as you! I wonder how it would seem to be considered first for once!"

The man, stirred by the shaky nature of her laugh, sensed some unfathomable emotion, and knew himself out beyond his depth. But Martha, softened by the humbled sweetness of Josiah's look, beamed back at him, though rising to escape an audacious hand which crept forward from bench to rounded arm.

I think, Marthy girl, that when the time comes you'll find you're first!"

Sensitively doubtful on this point, Martha was keenly alive to the dangerous proximity of the couple before noticed, though a mass of greenery screened them from view. Her reply was studiedly light. "That'll all settle itself, Joe; but won't it be cooler over there in the summer house?"

They gained the shelter of vine-draped shadow, safely hidden from prying eyes. The old lover, suddenly unmanageable, and detecting a surplus value, hitherto unsuspected in this woman treasure of his, claimed his own, releasing Martha at last with a heartfelt sigh of satisfaction. Her face bloomed with a transient girlishness, only to fade again at Josiah's next words, as he consulted his watch. Plague take it! I'll have to be goin' right soon, for I've got to go to the cemetery and back before supper."

She sidled away, coolly stripping a green spray bare of leaf and tendril. Got to?

Well, Anne expects it. I always take flowers to 'mother's grave on the tenth."

"Then it's time we're starting, if we want to catch the four o'clock car." Marth rose, brushing her lap free of its green litter.

Her tone was final, a wave of determination to end or change the course of this funeral courting, and to terminate daughterly domination, tumultuous within her.

"Marthy, I should think the eternal fitness of things would teach you it ain't the place for you!"

She bridled with becoming spirit: "I don't see how it's any more fitting for you than for me, unless you belong more to the dead than to the living. But I'm willing to share grief as well as joy with you, Josiah, for I don't know but I mourn her much as you do! You see her death put me in a fix where I get just a third of a man, the other two thirds going to a grave and a daughter. Now, I think a whole man ain't none too much to serve up to a good woman, 'specially if he's warmed over.

Ain't it

'bout time to quit personal care of a mound, when you leave off hugging another woman with a 'Plague take it!' that the decorating has got to be done?"

Josiah Markham felt himself swept from all his moorings by a gale of silent mirth, though he controlled his lips, only to have the fun sparks fanned into dancing flame in his gentle old eyes. Before he could turn away, Martha saw and her heart sang, for she had been bravely afraid.

"Of course, if you prefer graveyard visits alone to life with me, here's your ring; for from now on, where you go, I go, if we are to travel together in the future."

The intake of a sharp breath sobbed laughingly, the restored ring cutting into the flesh as Josiah vigorously shoved it over Martha's dimpled knuckle, and locked his arms about her. Victory inspired his dear foe to a new daring.

"And I'm going to have a white wedding dress, for it's all made!"

This passion of self-assertion trembled away into silence, Martha's head stubbornly turned aside from her lover's amused inspection. An access of pleased bravery wreathed Josiah's smile.

"You're right, my girl! dead right,

and I swan! you can just do as you eternally please, and I'll do as you say. We old duffers like to put every one else in our own class; but you're a skittish filly compared with your runnin' mate, Marthy; for, by gum, this ain't goin' to be any tandem affair from now on, but just you and me to the finish. Ez for that dress, I was only scairt you'd look too young for me."

Lifting a misty smile, Martha suddenly blazed into a glory of sunshine: "Sh-h-hi Look!"

With touch and tone she cautioned him to utter quiet, while parting the leaves for his near-sighted vision. Dizzy from the emotional whirl of things, Josiah found himself sucked into the vortex of jubilant excitement, as an undreamed of Anne burst upon his view.

His daughter stood, girlish and glowing, her heart in eyes fixed in grieved devotion on a stalwart young fellow, who with voice and gesture made virile protest against some dictum of hers. Indicating the deserted bench with a dominant gesture, he swept aside her hesitation by forcefully drawing Anne down. beside him, where the older pair had been.

"I won't stand for it! No one but a cad or a molly coddle would! You love me and you've got to marry me!"

"Rob, I can't! Don't make it harder for me!"

"Tommyrot! You've been on a debauch of self-obliteration till you can't see things straight. I shouldn't be surprised if he'd be glad to get rid of you. Have you told the old man of my valuable existence yet? And do you think this sneaking way of courting is filial in character or would meet with paternal approbation?"

The summer house was strangely agitated.

"No, Rob, I didn't dare to tell him anything. But I've promised father, and though he says he wants me to be like other girls and marry, I know he said it with a breaking heart!"

Martha clapped a silencing hand over Josiah's cave-like guffaw.

And you put that selfish old fraud ahead of me, when he stands between you and the inborn right to be happy in the

natural way which he claimed without question, at your age! How about my life smashed to smithereens? Where do I come in?

An older lover, choking, danced with his legs alone, the upper part of his body glued immovably to its peephole, while Martha's plump person undulated in a silent rapture. Anne, retreating behind concealing hands, grieved forlornly.

"Do you love him best, little Anne?" coaxed a seductive voice barely audible to the listeners.

The father gloried in youth's victory over age, exploding in gleeful chuckles, as Anne's slim body drooped toward Robert, the bowed head giving a decided though mournful negation.

Then why in the name of Cupid, do you put his happiness ahead of mine,- of ours?"

The girl's strangled answer was unheard in the summer house, but the man's retort was explosively clear:

The devil! You make me wish he'd drop down dead this minute!"

An apoplexy of restrained merriment threatened a realization of the wish, though Martha softly patted Josiah's back to an accompaniment of whispered warnings.

"Do you think I'm going to wait till he sees fit to shuffle off before I claim the woman I love?"

Strange noises proceeded from the summer house, but the exasperated young lover heard nothing save his sweetheart's gulping sob.

"Cut it out, Anne! There comes a policeman."

At Robert's bracing words the girl lifted a distracted face in a vain effort at self-control, only to look off sightlessly. Secretly yearning to apply the sole comfort man knows for woman's tears, Rob spoke brusquely, hoping to steady her.

"See here! Stop making an exhibition of yourself. Come on over to the summer house and we'll settle this once for all."

There was panic in the leafy bower as Martha massed her forces, with heart beating the attack and eyes fired by the light of battle.

Brave with the courage of cornered fear, Josiah Markham prepared to meet this unfamiliar daughter, while shrinking from the faithful fanaticism of the child he had known.

As the walk's crunching gravel heralded the inevitable clash of arms with the advancing host, the newly emancipated father slackened his hold of Martha's waist, only to find his embrace clamped in its proper place by a tremulously bold hand, while a gray-tinged head shamelessly burrowed on his breast, the woman shaken by some inner force into this masculine initiative.

At the sun-flecked entrance two lengthening shadows sweetly blent into one with a sound of soft impact, only to fall apart in scorching embarrassment at sight of their older prototypes. With drawling humor, Josiah spoke: "What a pleasant start you gave me, Anne!" Father!"

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Then it was Josiah proved himself of the quick rather than of the dead, as he felt the woman at his side shrink away timidly. Girding Martha close with one arm, he lifted the flushed face, touched by a shy sweetness, and kissed her on lips parted in breathless surprise at being first at last! Josiah turned to the stunned girl, the rebel flag of a new cause flaunting itself in his ruddy cheeks.

Bein' an up to date father, I reckon I can't do better than follow my daughter's example. Anne, this is Miss Marthy Leland, my dear wife to be; and I may be a bit old fashioned yet, but ain't it 'bout time I was meetin' my future son in law, for I take it, from your way of enterin', that's what he is?"

Gallantly leading Martha forward, Josiah twinkled into the convulsed face of the younger man.

His radiant Martha extended her free hand to Anne, without a word of verbal speech, a mute appeal and promise in the gentle charm of her manner. The girl wavered, turning in bewilderment from teasing lover to roguish father, while the fire of fun burned the shadows away from her own life. The situation proving too great for her grasp, Anne fell back upon the commonplace:

"Rob, this is father."