She flung the door open, and the boys crowded in.

"Well," exclaimed John, "words fail me!" Then he paused as his eyes fell upon his text in its new setting.

"Agnes!"

"That's with my best love," answered Agnes, blushing. "It is worth framing."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER XXII.

_MINNIE'S SECRET._

And so the time slipped away. Alice and Minnie found that when once they made up their minds to regular lessons with their sister they began to take an interest in them, and were really happier than they would have been to be idle.

Soon after they began one morning, aunt Phyllis's sweet face peeped in at the door.

"Any admittance, my dears?" she asked.

"Oh, do come in!" said Agnes, springing up to welcome her.

"I have thought of something which I am burning to propose to you," said Miss Headley, coming round to kiss each in turn.

"What is it?" asked Minnie, laying down her pen and pushing back her curls.

Aunt Phyllis did not answer till she had seated herself by the fire, then she said:

"You go out for your 'const.i.tutional' directly after your early dinner, do you not, dears?"

"Yes," said Alice, "and I wish we didn't."

Aunt Phyllis shook her head. "It is quite right, I have not come in to alter that, little puss."

Alice pouted just a very little, and Miss Headley went on:

"You come home about three, do you not?"

"Half past," said Agnes.

"What do you do then?"

"We work, or learn lessons, or gape, or are idle," said Alice, smiling a little.

Aunt Phyllis smiled too. "How should you like to bring your work in with me? I have an interesting book I want to read to you, and if Agnes is busy, or tired, she can stay at home, and I'll see to your work. Eh, Alice and Minnie?"

"Lovely!" answered Minnie.

"Awfully nice!" answered Alice.

And Agnes murmured thanks with a sigh of relief, for that hour in the day had been one of her trials.

"What work have you in hand?" asked their aunt.

"Minnie is making a doll's dress, and I have just finished some horrid white calico."

"It must be real, sensible work," said Miss Headley. "How about stockings?"

"Agnes mends those," answered Minnie; "it nearly made her cry to teach Alice, and she gave it up; and I haven't begun to learn."

Agnes looked rather ashamed.

"Oh, auntie," she explained, "I know I got out of patience, but I would ten times rather do it myself than make Alice."

"I don't believe I was very nice over it," said Alice in a low tone; "but it is nasty work!"

"Very," answered aunt Phyllis, so sympathizingly that Alice looked up amazed. "But only because you do not know how to do it. We will get over that in a little while. So both of you come in this afternoon with all the stockings you can find, and we will begin in good earnest."

"All?" said Minnie.

"Yes; then I can take my choice. I shall not give you bad ones to do first, they are too difficult for beginners."

"You are too kind, auntie," said Agnes, getting up to kiss her gratefully; then adding, "Didn't I tell you I was good for nothing?

Haven't even patience to help Alice mend stockings!"

"You are not going to the looking-gla.s.s again, my child?" she whispered, smiling.

Agnes smiled too, though she was crying quietly. She knelt down and poked the fire, and got rid of her tears somehow before anyone but her aunt guessed about them, and then she turned round to the table.

"I am afraid I am hindering," said aunt Phyllis, getting up; "but I am like a child when I have a piece of news--I must tell it."

So she went, and the girls settled down again.

"_Is_ aunt Phyllis like a child?" asked Minnie.

"I think she is," answered Agnes; "her heart always seems fresh and young."

"I wonder why?" said Alice.

"She reminds me of those words," answered Agnes, 'Like a tree planted by the rivers of waters.'

"Why?"

"Her soul is always drawing nourishment from Jesus; that's how it is.

Like the roots of the tree by the rivers of waters."