The Forerunner, vol 1 | Page 9

store and pay you good interest. I wish you would,
mother. We'd just love to have you here. You'd be such a comfort to me,
and such a help with the babies. And Joe just loves you. Do come now,
and stay with us. Here is the money for the trip.--Your affectionate
daughter, JEANNIE."
Mrs. Morrison laid this beside the other, folded both, and placed them
in their respective envelopes, then in their several well-filled
pigeon-holes in her big, old-fashioned desk. She turned and paced
slowly up and down the long parlor, a tall woman, commanding of
aspect, yet of a winningly attractive manner, erect and light-footed, still
imposingly handsome.
It was now November, the last lingering boarder was long since gone,

and a quiet winter lay before her. She was alone, but for Sally; and she
smiled at Andrew's cautious expression, "liable to accident." He could
not say "feeble" or "ailing," Sally being a colored lady of changeless
aspect and incessant activity.
Mrs. Morrison was alone, and while living in the Welcome House she
was never unhappy. Her father had built it, she was born there, she
grew up playing on the broad green lawns in front, and in the acre of
garden behind. It was the finest house in the village, and she then
thought it the finest in the world.
Even after living with her father at Washington and abroad, after
visiting hall, castle and palace, she still found the Welcome House
beautiful and impressive.
If she kept on taking boarders she could live the year through, and pay
interest, but not principal, on her little mortgage. This had been the one
possible and necessary thing while the children were there, though it
was a business she hated.
But her youthful experience in diplomatic circles, and the years of
practical management in church affairs, enabled her to bear it with
patience and success. The boarders often confided to one another, as
they chatted and tatted on the long piazza, that Mrs. Morrison was
"certainly very refined."
Now Sally whisked in cheerfully, announcing supper, and Mrs.
Morrison went out to her great silver tea-tray at the lit end of the long,
dark mahogany table, with as much dignity as if twenty titled guests
were before her.
Afterward Mr. Butts called. He came early in the evening, with his
usual air of determination and a somewhat unusual spruceness. Mr.
Peter Butts was a florid, blonde person, a little stout, a little pompous,
sturdy and immovable in the attitude of a self-made man. He had been
a poor boy when she was a rich girl; and it gratified him much to
realize--and to call upon her to realize--that their positions had changed.
He meant no unkindness, his pride was honest and unveiled. Tact he

had none.
She had refused Mr. Butts, almost with laughter, when he proposed to
her in her gay girlhood. She had refused him, more gently, when he
proposed to her in her early widowhood. He had always been her friend,
and her husband's friend, a solid member of the church, and had taken
the small mortgage of the house. She refused to allow him at first, but
he was convincingly frank about it.
"This has nothing to do with my wanting you, Delia Morrison," he said.
"I've always wanted you--and I've always wanted this house, too. You
won't sell, but you've got to mortgage. By and by you can't pay up, and
I'll get it--see? Then maybe you'll take me--to keep the house. Don't be
a fool, Delia. It's a perfectly good investment."
She had taken the loan. She had paid the interest. She would pay the
interest if she had to take boarders all her life. And she would not, at
any price, marry Peter Butts.
He broached the subject again that evening, cheerful and undismayed.
"You might as well come to it, Delia," he said. "Then we could live
right here just the same. You aren't so young as you were, to be sure;
I'm not, either. But you are as good a housekeeper as

ever--better--you've had more experience."
"You are extremely kind, Mr. Butts," said the lady, "but I do not wish
to marry you."
"I know you don't," he said. "You've made that clear. You don't, but I
do. You've had your way and married the minister. He was a good man,
but he's dead. Now you might as well marry me."
"I do not wish to marry again, Mr. Butts; neither you nor anyone."
"Very proper, very proper, Delia," he replied. "It wouldn't look well if
you did--at any rate, if you showed it. But why shouldn't you? The
children are gone now--you can't hold them up against me any more."

"Yes, the children are both settled now, and doing nicely," she
admitted.
"You don't