wait that long.

He bought some shining sticks of red and white peppermint and turned to the toys. There was a tiny sailboat with a little wooden sailor on deck; but Robin would always be dabbling in the water if he got that. A tin horse and cart caught his eye. That would make such a clatter on the bare kitchen floor.

At last he chose a gay yellow jumping-jack. All the way home he kept feeling the two little bundles in his pocket. He could not help smiling when the gables of the old house came in sight, thinking how delighted Robin would be.

He could hardly wait till the horses were put away and fed, and he changed impatiently from one foot to another, while Mr. Dearborn searched in the straw of the wagon-bed for a missing package of groceries. Then he ran to the house and into the big, warm kitchen, all out of breath.

"Robin," he called, as he laid the armful of groceries on the kitchen table, "look what Brother's brought you. Why, where's Robin?" he asked of Mrs. Dearborn, who was busy stirring something on the stove for supper. She had her back turned and did not answer.

"Where's Robin," he asked again, peering all around to see where the bright curls were hiding.

She turned around and looked at him over her spectacles. "Well, I s'pose I may's well tell you one time as another," she said reluctantly. "Rindy came for him to-day. We talked it over and thought, as long as there had to be a separation, it would be easier for you both, and save a scene, if you wasn't here to see him go. He's got a good home, and Rindy'll be kind to him."

Steven looked at her in bewilderment, then glanced around the cheerful kitchen. His slate lay on a chair where Robin had been scribbling and making pictures. The old cat that Robin had petted and played with that very morning purred comfortably under the stove. The corncob house he had built was still in the corner. Surely he could not be so very far away.

He opened the stair door and crept slowly up the steps to their little room. He could scarcely distinguish anything at first, in the dim light of the winter evening, but he saw enough to know that the little straw hat with the torn brim that he had worn in the summer time was not hanging on its peg behind the door. He looked in the washstand drawer, where his dresses were kept. It was empty. He opened the closet door. The new copper-toed shoes, kept for best, were gone, but hanging in one corner was the little checked gingham apron he had worn that morning.

Steven took it down. There was the torn place by the pocket, and the patch on the elbow. He kissed the ruffle that had been buttoned under the dimpled chin, and the little sleeves that had clung around his neck so closely that morning. Then, with it held tight in his arms, he threw himself on the bed, sobbing over and over, "It's too cruel! It's too cruel! They didn't even let me tell him good-by!"

He did not go down to supper when Mrs. Dearborn called him, so she went up after a while with a glass of milk and a doughnut.

"There, there!" she said soothingly; "don't take it so hard. Try and eat something; you'll feel better if you do."

Steven tried to obey, but every mouthful choked him. "Rindy'll be awful good to him," she said after a long pause. "She thinks he's the loveliest child she ever set eyes on, but she was afraid her husband would think he was too much of a baby if she took him home with those long curls on. She cut 'em off before they started, and I saved 'em. I knew you'd be glad to have 'em."

She lit the candle on the washstand and handed him a paper. He sat up and opened it. There lay the soft, silky curls, shining like gold in the candle-light, as they twined around his fingers. It was more than he could bear. His very lips grew white.

Mrs. Dearborn was almost frightened. She could not understand how a child's grief could be so deep and passionate.

He drew them fondly over his wet cheeks, and pressed them against his quivering lips. Then laying his face down on them, he cried till he could cry no longer, and sleep came to his relief.

Next morning, when Steven pulled the window curtain aside, he seemed to be looking out on another world. The first snow of the winter covered every familiar object, and he thought, in his childish way, that last night's experience had altered his life as the snowdrifts had changed the landscape.

He ate his breakfast and did up the morning chores mechanically. He seemed to be in a dream, and wondered dully to himself why he did not cry when he felt so bad.

When the work was all done he stood idly looking out of the window. He wanted to get away from the house where everything he saw made his heart ache with the suggestion of Robin.

"I believe I'd like to go to church to-day," he said in a listless tone.