She and Tess, however, were soon quite friendly with the invalid. Posy bustled about between kitchen and sitting room, laying a round table in the latter room for tea for the expected guests. Mr. Buckham, having sc.r.a.ped his boots, came in.

"Well, how be ye, Marm?" he asked his wife, kissing her as though he had just returned from a long journey.

"Just the same, Bob," she replied, laughing. "I ain't been fur from my chair since you was gone."

Mr. Buckham chuckled hugely at this old pleasantry between them. They both seemed to accept her affliction as though it were a joke, or a matter of small importance. Yet Mrs. Buckham had been confined to her chair and her bed for twenty years.

Before Ruth and Agnes, with Neale O'Neil, reached the farmhouse, driving over from Lycurgus Billet's chestnut woods, Tess and Dot were having a most delightful visit. Dot was amusing Mrs. Buckham with her chatter, and likewise holding a hank of yarn for the invalid to wind off in a ball; while Tess, of course, had got upon her favorite topic of conversation, and was telling Mr. Buckham all about the need of the Women's and Children's Hospital, and about Mrs. Eland.

"You see, she's such an awfully nice lady--and so pretty," said Tess, warmly. "It would be an awful thing if she had to go away--and she hasn't any place to go. But the hospital's _got_ to have money!"

"Eland--Eland?" repeated Mr. Bob Buckham, reflectively. "Isn't that name sort o' familiar, Marm?" he asked his wife.

"The Aden girl married an Eland," said Mrs. Buckham, quickly. "He died soon after and left her a widow. Is it the same? Marion Aden?"

"Mrs. Eland's name is Marion," said Tess, confidently. "She signed it to a note to us. Didn't she, Dot?"

"In the apple," replied Dot, promptly.

"What does the child mean--'in the apple'?" queried the laughing Mrs.

Buckham.

"That's how she sent us our invitation to her party," said Dot.

"Only to an afternoon tea, child!" exclaimed Tess, quickly. "That isn't a party." Then she explained to Mrs. Buckham about the apples and the one that came back with the note inside. Meanwhile the farmer was very quiet and thoughtful.

"So," finished Tess, breathlessly, "we're going to stop at the hospital on our way home from school next Monday afternoon. Aren't we, Dot?"

"Ye-es," said the smaller girl, this time doubtfully. "If Mrs. MacCall finishes my Alice-doll's new cloak. Otherwise she can't go, and of course I can't go without her. She hasn't a thing fit to wear, now it's come fall."

"You ask Mrs. Eland," broke in Mr. Buckham, "if she happens to be any relation to Lemuel Aden."

"Now, Bob!" said his wife in an admonitory undertone, "never mind raking up dead and gone happenings."

"But I'm just curious--just curious," said the farmer. "Nothing to be done now about it----"

"Bob!"

"Well," subsided the farmer, "a man can't help thinkin' about money that he's lost. And that five hundred dollars was stole from us as sure as you're alive to-day, Marm."

"Never mind," his wife said lightly. "You've earned several five hundreds since that happened--you know you have, Bob Buckham. What's the good of worrying?"

"Ain't worrying," denied the farmer, quickly. "But I do despise a thief.

I was brought up on the motter:

"''Tis a sin To steal a pin; 'Tis a greater To steal a' 'tater!'

Ain't that so, children?" he concluded, chuckling.

Now, Ruth and Agnes were being ushered into the room by the broadly smiling Posy just as Mr. Buckham recited this old jingle. Agnes flushed to the roots of her hair, and then paled with alarm. She expected, then and there, to be accused with the heinous offence of having picked strawberries without permission in Mr. Bob Buckham's field!

"Oh! what a pretty girl!" cried the invalid. "Come here, my dear, and let me pinch those cheeks. You need not blush so; I'm sure you've been told you were pretty before--and I hope it hasn't spoiled you," and Mrs.

Buckham laughed heartily.

"I should know you were little Theresa's sister," continued the lady, as Agnes tremblingly approached. "She will be just such another when she gets to be as old as you, I am sure.

"And of course, this is Ruth," and she welcomed the oldest Corner House girl, too. "Four such splendid girls must make their mother's heart glad."

"I hope we did make her glad when she was with us," Ruth said quietly.

"But we have no mother now; and no father."

"Oh, my dear!" cried the invalid, in quite a shocked tone. "I had no idea----"

"We miss our mother and our father. Even Dot can remember them both,"

said Ruth, still calmly. "But it happened so long ago that we do not cry about it any more--do we, girls?"

As the oldest sister spoke, the other three seemed to be involuntarily drawn to her. Dot took one hand and snuggled it against her soft, dark cheek. Tess put both arms about Ruth's neck and warmly kissed her. Agnes already had her arm around her elder sister's waist.

"I see," said Mrs. Buckham, with sudden appreciation. "The others do not miss the lost and gone mother, for a very good reason. I am sure you have done your duty, Ruth Kenway."

"I have tried to," Ruth said simply. "And they have all been good children, and helped."

"I ain't a doubt of it--I ain't a doubt of it," repeated Mrs. Buckham, briskly.

Agnes was watching the changing expression of the old lady's face, wondering if--as Neale had said--Mr. Buckham could not write, the invalid had sent in the list of girls' names to the princ.i.p.al of the Milton High. The old farmer himself might be unlettered; but Mrs.

Buckham, Agnes was sure, must have had some book education.

Right at the invalid's hand, indeed, were two shelves fastened under the window sill, filled with books--mostly of a religious character. And their bindings showed frequent handling.

Posy brought in the steaming tea urn. "Come on now, folks," said Mrs.

Buckham. "I'm just a honin' for a cup of comfort. That's what I call it.

Tea is my favorite tipple--and I expect I'm just as eager for it as a poor drunkard is after liquor. Dear me! I never could blame them that has the habit for drink. I love my cup of comfort too well."

Posy was putting Tess and Dot into their chairs. The farmer awoke from his brown study, got up, stretched himself, and, with a smile, wheeled his wife's chair to the table.

"There ye be, Marm," he said. "All right?"

"All right, Bob," she a.s.sured him.

"Yes," the farmer said, turning to the children with a broader smile, "you ask your friend, Mrs. Eland, if she's related to Lemuel Aden. Seems to me she is his brother Abe's darter. Lem was a sharper; but Abe was a right out an' out----"

"Now, Bob!" interposed his wife. "That's all gone and done for."

"Well, so 'tis, Marm. But I can't never forget it. I was a boy and my marm was a widder woman. The five hundred dollars was all we had--every cent we had in the world," he added, looking about at the interested faces of his visitors.

"Abe Aden was a lawyer, or suthin' like that. He was a dabster at most things, includin' horse-tradin'. My father had put all the money he had in the world in Abe's hands, in some trade or other. We tried to git it back when father was kill't so sudden in the sawmill.

"Just erbout then Abe got inter trouble in a horse-trade. He was a good deal of a Gyp--so 'twas said. He left everything in Lem's hands and skedaddled out West. But he didn't leave no five hundred dollars in Lem's hands for _us_--no, sir!" and the old man shook his head ruminatively.