THE IMMEDIATE JEWEL.

Waikato Times, Volume 88, Issue 13488, 19 May 1917, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE IMMEDIATE JEWEL.

(By Alice Garland Steele, i

Hi** name was Mr Bibbin-! Tho Girl learned that the very first eight, but sue was not interested, ohe was too heart-sick to be liiteiesU-d in anything in this new lite except keeping Iter new job with I'. Lalder and Co., Waistmakers. That she had taken a liaiiroom in Mrs M 'Queen's boarding-house because it was tne cheapest thing she could, find in a big city, did not imply thai she wished to enter into personal relations with Mrs M'Qtiecn's tableguests. She "thought, proudiy, mat they were not her son. It was characteristic of the Girl that .die could be both shabby" and proud at the frame time.

So she sat very still that first night and tried to eat tier dinner because sue must work hard on it to-morrow, and Tied not to look at the hare place on oer slender left hand where a shining jewel had rested six mouths before, not to think of the Man who had placed it there! The Man had been sweni into the past along with a number ol other things she once thought she could not live without, and the Girl had been lett to go on alone, with a flat purse, an ache in her heart, and a pair of brown eyes that would torrver now a-k a question before they trusted —a foolish little question: "Are you truer" It was just hero that Mrs M'Queen, bustling in with fresh dishes, asked: "Ain't anv of you folks seen .Mr Bibbins r" Everybody looked at an empty chair next to the Girl and said "No, hot since breakfast. ' -All but Miss Par.sj Connors, on the Girl's right. Sin- looked full at Mrs M'Queen and said: "I'll WJ you where he is, Qu.eeuie— lie's down at the Crystal Palace Shoe Store helping that tool kid Jimmy Driggs to ho id down his job!" "Land alive;" said Mrs M'Queen, "it that ain't like Mr Bibbins! Piling up night-work, when he'd oughter be sate home eating his good dinner, He ain'tacting on the square by hi.s stonilhtek, that young man ain't!" "Well," drawled Pansy, "he's doing the square' by Jimmy, winch is tho act of a Christian, though I say it that ain't much on the church stuff myself." And she added, for the Girl's benefit: "Bibbins, every now and then, goes and does something spectacular, but you don't dare to pat him on the back! If hia right hand guessed what his left was doing he'd go and cut it otf—that's* his style!" The Girl lifted her dark lashes for the briefest of glances. "I am not acquainted," she said., "with the person you refer to."' * , Miss Connors stared. She took iu the Girl's pale pride, as well as- her fine, much-darned shirt-waist, but she snittej at it, much as the Girl, in her heart, had sniffed at Mr Bibbins' name. ■ i beg your pardon," she said, and then she added; ''Believe m 6, it's your loss!" She acted', for the rest of the meal, as if the Girl's chair were like the one next to it —empty! As for the Girl, she caught herself, once or twice, watching tho do r. It was perfectly absurd, but she seemed to be waiting for it to open up lor Mr Bibbins. Afterward, sho climbed the weary stairs to her room and sat at the. open window with sad eyes. It was young April, a time for dreams, but tho Girl, conscious of a locked trunk that hid a very thin packet of letters signed with the name of the Man who was not true, felt that she could never dream again. She sat there instead, thinking that once, in April, there had been a home garden filled with baby crocuses and early daffodils. She had plucked one, on a night like this, and tucked it in the Man's buttonhole—now they grew above her mother's grave- Sue sat there, her hands in her lap, listening to the noises that floated up from tho street below, until <juddeiiiy she could bear it no longer. She drew the blind with a sob, and. went hurriedly to bed.

She did not sleep. Hours later, through the she heard a man> step on the stairs, and Mrs M'Queen's voice calling from a lower hall: "Would you mind, Mr Bibbins, sir, turningout that there light on the top landing'''" And a muffled bass reply: "All 0.K., Mrs M'Queen—good night!" Through the weary days that followed, the Girl did the things that she migbt never do again. She went out, a slim little black T and-white shadow, through aftirfe M'Queen's front door, to drag herself back to it at dusk, with dark rima under her long lashes, and a heart almost tired of beating, hut not tired of being brave. Once. Miss Pansy Couuors, in a flowered kimono, rapped at her door to share a bag of pe-chos. Miss Connors K,hared many things, including her confidences, with her lollow-boarders, but fthe said afterward to the ''first floor back*': "That girl was harder to warm tip to than tii.; iceman, take it from me! I couldn't get a thing out of her except that she was in black for a near relation 1 And mo gassing there to her for ten minutes through a crack in the door!"

As for Mr Bibbins, he and the Girl Mjemed to be. playing a f ant attic game of "hide-and-seek." She came upon odd little traces of him, but that was all. The chair at table continued to bo empty. A tattered individual ajvpeared. at the basement door one evening with a card. Mrs M'Queen, very red in the face, exclaimed: "Well, I m«rer!" and banded it across to Miss Connors, who pawed it back again with ;8. queer littlo full-throated laugh. "Wouldn't that jar you?" said Patisy, and rolled her line eyes upward. The Girl fixed her* resolutely on her plate. She bad, against her will, seen the brief pencilled message on the back: '"Please give this man my dinner, I won't bo home. Bibbin9." Home! She felt a sudden contempt for the man who could call this poor placff by a name so dear. Home meant encircling arms, lighted windowspoverty, perhaps, but love always! Mrs M'Queen hoisted a pork-chop and two baked potatoes on to a clean jjate. "Well," she sighed, "I guo=s I «ot to deliver the goods," adding. twith business acumen, and a trouble:!. [glance down the table at a thin youn.? woman who did dressmaking by the da v— "Th ey' re paid f or!" The Girl, climbing the weary stairs again, curved her young lips into the first smile they had known for many week?, Something else happened an evening or two later. Tho thin dressmaker, in a new silk waifit, passed her in the hall. She stopped the Girl with a stiff little gesture. "Oh. would you mind telling >mo if —if this hat looks all right? 1 can make clothes, but I —l don't seem to bo able to make much of hato, and \ —l so wanted to look nice to-night!" Sh»o spoko in a faintly muffled voice, a r: if hV r mouth were still full of pin 9. The, Girl felt a sudden sympathy. <.jt—jt, looks quite pretty." she said 1-eenly; and the little dressmaker, warming to tho tone, told her news with «t s;idde>i wave of emotion: "I am out to the theatre —with Mr BibHns!"

Tho Oirl moved' on thoughtfully. "Was ho also a Bo.au Bruromel, ■or —or did he hist, ninoe ho pronounced this horrible plflOe Immo, ook upon tho ' dressmaker as a member of his family? In that ease, the Girl sniffed her disdain, ho wavM l>o claiming her next, p—as a sister' •This preposterous Mr Bibbins! Meanwhile, tho Girl found out that P. ('alder was a left-over fragment of die Stone Age. His methods with new •svAifW-hands wove- rooky. He had t. way »if waning in, unannouneed, from the small fonelc office to the long room where 'tho machines wore humming, and ot svtandlnjc over you. watching you clip •jn laco irteerM till you grew flushed and •dizzy and rondo a'mistake —then, with ■:\ foot shoved in to stop your treadle,! ilie liad it out. with you- . \ Ho had it out. several times with •the Girl. Each time she felt that sho could bear it no longer, and each time, trery very humbly, sbe picked Mit the wrong stitches, and made crooked places straight, and rough n'.aoes smooth, while ?. Calder, manipulating a tooth-pick, sauntered back to stretch himself, and perform economic* on the pay-rolj

he told the Girl

ter, apt! thai somewhere, somewhere in God's heaven there way still a guardian angel who would lift her up lest she dash her loot against a stone.

That night the Girl, after paying her board-bill, counted the money' in her purse. She had just two dollars and twenty-six cents. Then she knelt down and said her prayers. She asked to be kept from making mistakes on tho shirtwaists, and 10 have courage to go on fighting to forgei the Man who was not true.

The riext day was Sunday. The Girl did not go out. She lay on her bed with shoulders that ached, and listened to Pansy Connors playing, with a brilliant disregard or' sharps and fla s. "I'm Proud to be tho Mother of a So.dier." On the front stoop Mr MQuee.i in frank shirt-sleeves was announcing lurid views on politics to a very re i young man who did bookkeeping lor a pork-butcher: From the hot avenue came the cheerful clang of the trolleys. But the Girl, with nerves stretched ti tho breaking-point, wondered how anything could he cheerful in such a. noisy world. It was then, on the floor below, that a baby began to cry.

The Girl sat. up, listening. It was such a torturing cry. as if it must be at tho least a very dangerous kind o: colic! With a nervous gesture, she put her tumbled hair straight. Her checks were slightly flushed, her eyes brightly feverish. She looked as'if, on very short notice, she might cry herself! Instead, she hastily opened her door and leaned far ever the banister.

A man wa.s walking up and down with a fat baby hoisted ou his shoulder —a tall man, with slight stoop. Tho child, its fingers clutched iu his hair, was screaming lustily. "Oh, what is it r" demanded the Gir! nervously. The man-looked up. He wore, glasses, and li had gray, rather short-sighted. eyes. One could not have guessed his age. but his features, without being handsome wore, reassuring. "I'm afraid it's temper," lie said cheerfully. "His naine is Buster ami he's crying for his mother!" He added, tipping the child's chin upward l —"See the pretty lady." The Girl, about to beat a hasty and indignant retreat, reconsidered, and merely flushed hotly. It was said in a purely impersonal way, as one might urge a child of large growth to "See the chu-chu car!" But it added to her confusion that the baby, beating the ai* with sturdy arms, made a violent motion in her direction. "He wants to go to you," said the tall man. "Would you mind holding him a minute:'" •

Without volition the Girl somehow found herself sitting on the top step with a strange baby in her lap, whi\e the baby's father leaning back against the stair rail, mopped hit* forehead and drew a long breath. The baby had stopped crying to say "Goo!" The Gir! hoped Miss Connors would not decide to come up this special staircase. "Where is—its motherr" The Girl's voice, fluttered as she put the faint question.

"His mother? Oh, I sent her out for a. walk," said the man; "you see, it does her a lot of good to get'away from him once in a while—and it's such a great afternoon." The Girl lifted her eyes. Utter desolation crept into their brown depths. "I'm glad it strikes somebody that way," she said.

The man looked at her as if for tho first time. >Tm afraid," hj,. said humbly, "Buster and I have spoiled it for you."

"Oh, no." said the Girl hurriedly, "«iot at all."

"I thought." said the man, "I could keep him quiel with the 'Eunnv Page," be he's a bit young for it yet. I've tried ev< ry Known method, except a mouth gag," he added, smilingly, "to stop him."

. 'lt's a wonder," said' tho Girl, curling her lips, '•you didn't send for the Special Boarding House Wonder—Mr Bibbins!'' The next instant, she could have bitten her tongue out, for the man seemed «s covered with confusion. "So you think," he asked, adjusting his glasses, "that Bibbins could have done the trick?" {

"I ni sure of it," said- the Girl steadi.?". "I haven't met. the person, but according to hearsay he is most unusual." ".Vow that," said the man. "is mighty interesting, because you see l am Mr Hibbins."

The Girl .stared. "Aren't you the baby's father?"

Mr hibbins shook his head. He seemed all at once, to have difficulty in >P«*aiviug. His faee had turned an honest crimson. "No," he said in a low voice, "no. I'm not. His father was—a kind of a friend of mine. He was the letter carrier on this route, and to? went, under at Christmas—died 1 mean," he said simply. "They had lived for six months or so in this house, so I sort of promised him I'd keep an eye on his bov."

Hut the Girl had hastily risen. She. stood, straight and slender, with Bibbins' "baby" in her arm's, but she would not look at Bibbins. She was thinking riotously that he had stolen a march ou her, caught up with her, as it were, in the dark, and flashed his personality, like a lantern, full upon her. It was dbconot rting, and—unfair! She did not wish to be friendly with any of these people, least of all Mr B.hbin's! "I —really must go," she said. Her voice was high and sweet. Her eyes, sweeping Mr Bibbins as he stood on the. step below .enveloped him, as it were, in a cold little vapor. Mr Bibbins, staring back at her. became ail at once embarrassed. "Oh, I say." be said, "we didn't mean to waylay you like this!" And he added, its he lifted the child again to his shoulder, "Buster is. a regular highwayman—he holds up everybody he happens to take a fancy to! Don't you kid?"

But the Girl had already taken refuge in her room. It became, alter this, a matter of avoiding Mr Bibbins. It was as if Fate had set a trap for her. Mr Bibbins seemed to be everywhere. The Girl, hurrying out in the morning, would run into Mr Bibbins just taking his hat from the peg, and Mr Bibbins would say, in tint friendly voice of his, "Now, isn't this great!" Or, coming home at night, with every nerve quivering, she would stumble into Mr Bibbins in tho dark vestibule, and he would nod cheerfully and say, "Well, how did it go today?" That the Girl never told him did not seem to matter.

It was the same tiling in the diningroom. Now that Jimmy Driggs' job was nailed hard and fast, .Mr Bibb ins was always there. Twice, on a hot night, he brought homo ice cream for the crowd. The Girl did not take any. And then, one Saturday evening, he invited the Girl to go with Mrs M 'Queen to the Hippodrome. "It would do yon a lot of pood," he said. ''I —I hope yon will go with us," and he added flushing: '"She'd enjoy it so much mere to hove a friend along." The fiirl murmured something—she "really couldn't," thanking him just the same. It was then that lie looked with a sudden awkward sympathy, at her b'.aek dress, and thought he understood. But he didn't. That night the Girl read the thin packet of letter-, and cried herself to sleer>. It hurt h< r, liis- friendliness. Until J'atsy Connor* put her straight. "You would think.' 1 she said, "now wouldn't you that he was dead stuck on taking the creates out of your life and making it happy! Well, he is. He feels the same way to every living mature. It's Bibbins' way! I think myself." shp added, "it's a heavenly way, Inn .that little drr-s-vfnaker takes it too much to heart! Bibbins is just the, milk of human kindness served fresh to everybody that happens to live alonp; his route."

This simplified matters. The Girl, after a while. got. to smiling hark nt Bihhins when he asked her how it wont. She even got to saying little things aeroso the rioe-pudding, and R!Vihin«. behind hi- glasses, just plowed'. One miajht just us pel! be ple.tsnnt, thought thefiirl. She was havinsr, that week, rather a tearful time at the Oal-

d'T Waist Company. The nights were closing in now. for it was December, and the electric lights hurt her eye? so that, she wa« making more mistake* than ever. She lived in hourly fear of heing "laid off." Onec- she hugged Buster and told him so. when he tottered out alone into the hall. He and his mother lu'od in the little hall-room underneath her own. where ih: mother

Ho placed his hand among Buster's curls. "That's a good idea," he said He was looking at the Girl with a strange expression. "You can always sing the Doxology about something you know." Hut what he was thinking was that she looked wonderfully sweet as she. crouched on the stairs with the chud.

. "ive-wanted," said the Girl, "e/er since J came here, to ask you a question!" She said it a little' breathlessly, as it she were very much in earnest "Hon- can yon call this plaee—home?"' Mr Bibbins laughed. "Why, that's an easy one 1 can answer that right oil the bat!" b

She was looking at him intently. Her eyas were, wistful and very, very sad "Vou see," said Mr Bibbins, running his hand through Buster's hair, "1 have an old mother who live.s away off in Vermont I began with the" 'home' business them There were just four of us. all kids together. Well, my lather died, and "one of my brothers got married, and—it was a little piace— the rest ot us had to go away. We just got scattered, somehow, like the four winds!'

"Vesr" said the Girl. Mr Bibbins paused. "Now my mother you see, she taught. -us what home is there, alone," he said qu.etlv, "but you see, taught us what home meant. She taught us that you could just make any old place home if you nad the right, idea about it," said*Mr Bibbins. lie was smiling again. "1 hat's the. answer," he said. The Girl nodded. "It's a great thing," she murmured, "to have the right idea."

"ion bet it is," said Mr Bibbins..He was hoisting Buster to the old place on his shoulder. "Come on, old chap," he said. "I've got live, minutes to teach you jiu-jitsu.-' The Girl went though f nil v up the stairs. She got out of "the trunk that held the letters, the picture of the Man who was not true, and she looked at it a long time. The fact* never failed to reach down to the old- place where so many girlish hopes lay buried. Memory so tar, had insisted on covering them with flowers. But this time the Girl's hand trembled, and she huried'lv laid the back again, as sho said something to her heart like this—"You would never, never have lieeu happy with that Man, beeauser-truth is the finest thing in the world, and he was not true!"

It was four days before Christmas. Miss Pansy Connors, her manicure bag still in her hands, panted up the four flights from the basement, and, still in her street things, rapped at the Girl's door. She looked flushed and breathless.

"Yes? What is it?" called the Girl's voice. It carried a sound of strain with

"Honest, J won't keep you," said Pansy, "but I've got to come in a minute and tell you the news about Bibbins!"

Tho Girl opened her door and stood there, in shadow.

Pansy crossed to the one chair. "He's got his big raise!" she said. She turned he« lace, all gKiwing. to the Girl. "And I'm such a blooming idiot." said Miss Connors, "thai I want to cry about it, so there!" • "That's line," said the Girl. "Fine? Spread yourself a little, dearie, and use a bigger word! That teller lias worktd up from office boy to manager of a whole department. Can you beat it, for style?" «

"I'm -. glad." said the Girl, "tor Mr Bibbins."

likii's all-right too." said Miss Connors. "I can do toe rejoicing act my. self—but he's got to go off to St.'Louis to live—that's what, gets me! Quesiiie's that upset, she says she'd like to give up the boarding bouse and go West herself!"

The Girl went over and sat on the little iron bed. She was stilUin shadow. "You mean," she said slowly, ''that Mr Bibbiiis—will have to no aw'avr"' Miss Connors nodded. The.ro seemed to l>e a kind of lump in her full throat. "Of course." sli,•• said fiercely. "and r* toll you it hurts, Girlie! If f was ten years younger I'd give way to my feelings!" She got up and went to the window, and with her back to the Girl stared down on tho little, common street.. The Girl did not apeak. Her hands, in her lap. lay listless, her shoulders sagged a little. Miss Connors turned back again. ••Bibbins," she said, "has lived 1 here along with tho family goinu on sixyears, and it's going to l>c mighty dull —without him. Oh, I'm not" in love with him —don't go and get that idea into your hewd! I'm just upset!" '•Oh—'' said tho Girl. Her breath caught a little.

"But you needn't, think," choked Miss Connors, "that I'm not glad, all the same, for —for Bibbins! It's just that I'm feeling -a trifle sorry for myself!" The next instant she had whirled out of the door.

Thei Girl put one arm on the cold iron rail of the bed, then laid her cheek upon it. But she did not cry. though it was four days to Christmas, and she had just received her discharge from the Calder Waist Company. She sat very still in the cold dusk and thought of Mr Bibbins' good fortune She was very, very glad for Mr Bibbins. and she was thinking that, after all, you get, in this world, the things you deserve—Bibbins was finding life fine and beautiful' because he had worked his way down into the heart of the. world.

Tbo Girl was still sitting there, in the dark, when the Im.'H rang loudly for dinner. She did not move She could not have eaten, so what was the use? Sho thought of them all sitting therePansy, with her rough, warm speech, and the thin, little dressmaker with her painful blushes, and'the pork butcher's clerk and good, vulgar Mrs M'Queen, and Buster's brave little mother —she hear them all wishing gord luck and long life to Bibbins, and see him adjusting the glasses to his kind, shortsighted eyes as he murmured his protest —"Oh, I say " And it was just here, when she realised that they would not miss her, that the truth swept like a flashlight over her lonely little soul —she was going to miss Bibbins. Then the Girl cried. "Here's your dinner, (ktarie, on a nice clean tray!" Mrs M'Queon's voice at the door struck on the aching silence. "And I've a message from Mr Bibbins —he wants you to go shopping with him for some prcs< nts he's a mind to get, but he said particular you was to oat. 1 your dinner first!"

The Girl opened the door. She looked at the big, stout woman with the. loaded tray in her hands, and then she did something that surprised Mrs M Queen so that she nearly dropped it —the Girl leaned over and put one arm around Mrs M'Qnoen's neck and kissed her!

Mr Bibbins. in the parlor, looked up as the Girl entered. "I say," he said, "you don't mind " He seemed vested in a huge embarrassment. "Mind?" said the Girl, with a little laugh that had tears behind it. "Do you know 1 was afraid Christmas was going to leave me out this year!" She struggled with the button of her shahby glove. "I —I'm not much of a shopper," said Hr Bibbins candidly, "and —I've got something very special to buy. It's—it's a ring." ''Yes?" said the Girl, but Mr Bibbins did not go on. He just led her. without further words, into the frosty night. He scorned, she thought, as shn> kept pace with his eager stride, quite lifted out of himself, and altogether glowing. Afterward, when on the way to ilie jeweller's he stopped at a big arcade and "threw in" a great Teddyhear for Busrter and a tie of many colors for the pork-butcher's clerk, and a gold thimble for the thin dressmaker, the Girl kne-iv what it was —Ribbing was iust st tit rated with that elusive thing wlvo'i children have christened Clans," and grown people call "Thei Spirit of Giving!" i always give 'em little hings. you know," he explained happily, "things thev wouldn't nave the nerve to buy for themselves." He was just selecting a "lock, with a real cathedral chime, frr Mrs M'Qu n en's dinsv parlor. -- And. this vear." he ended. "I en snrcad myself n little because T happen to be in luck." The Girl with grave, brown eves hur-

had sheltered her real self for so many months. "We shall just hate to have you go!" she said, and hit her lips to iceep the ears back, and smiled full into At Biobins' honesi lace.

"Uh, 1 say," said Mr Bibbins ."will you:-" And you could see that he was pleased as Punch that the Girl Dad said

They went ou to the jeweller's, Bihbins carrying the Teddy-near, and tue G.ri trying her best- to reflect the lignts ou his glowing lace. Sue would not chink ot P. Oaklet's grulf dismissal, nor of the black and empty days to wine. tor this one night at least she would walk in tho lamp-beams ol this mans beautiful, impersonal tricndnuessi

"1 want a ring," said Mr Bibbins to the clerk, "lor a lady."'

The clerk, who judged pecket-books »y exteriors, took in the G-.fl's worn oiack and brought out a showy tray, but Bi'obius gravely pushed, it a.side. "Not that kind," tie Wd briefly. "1 want a good one." the tiers, who again had his own ideas, slipped Ins hand into tho case .ind, mid two or three shining solita.res upou the counter. "These, ' he said, "ate our very latest 'Engagements'." He smirked a little. ( "If the young uuty would try one on -" 'l'm afraid," said Mr Bibbins, glancing earnestly at the Girl's hand as she Hastily withdrew it, "that wouldn't be iiiy use—you see, it's for a bigger hand than hers." He held a ring against Jie light. "I say," ho said, "do you like it?"

But the Girl found it difficult to speak at all. She managed a nod. She Aould not look at the clerk again. Her heart was pounding in a hurt,. desper : ate way, and she felt horribly a.shamed! Just because it had suddenly occurred to her that it would be beautiful to wear any ring, even for a moment, bought by Mr Bibbins. "1 want it," .said'Bibbins in a low voice to the Girl, "to be a first-class affair, you know, because it's got a—a sort of sentiment attached to it,"

But the Girl, passing her breathless little opinion, was only conscious of an agony to have the business over, and to get out again into the friendly, sheltering darkness. "It's all right," said Mr Bibbins.

"Tie it up, please." He certainly was a poor shopper, tor the price appeared not to matter at all. He just laid down the crisp new bills as if he hated to have money come into it. Then he took the Girl home. They didn't speak all the way. Bibbins seemed wrapped in the glory of his purchases, and the Girl, from a- very different cause, was speechless. In that illuminating moment at the jeweller's she had read, for the first time, her own heart. It was as if the shining jewel, held high in Bibbins' hand, had flashed its rays across the darkened corner where lurked the image of the Man who was not true, showing it for what it was, a blackened shadow, a wraith that dissolved and crumbled at n breath. The Girl knew it now —what she had thought a shrine was only an idea—she had not been, even in the old rainbow days, in love with the Man who was not true; she had been in love with what the Man lrfiglu have been, and was not! Bibbins had shown her the difference. As Bibbins fitted his key into the lock, he paused a moment, "I say," lie said, "I've got a lot to thank you for. you know." "And I," said the Cirl humbly, "have a lot to thank you for. you know!" She could go that far withoutgiving herself away to Bibbins. "I shall ho going off early in the morning." added Mr Bibbins; "in fact. I'm taking a little Christmas holiday." The Girl, who wondered how the Christiaas dinner would get itself rooked: and eaten without Bibbins, said no word. She leaned a little heavily against the imitation hrown-stone stoop and thought, how lovely it would be for Bibbins to have his holiday. "You see," said Bibbins, '"that ring is going to be a teetotal surprise, and 1 want to be in on it. That's another sentiment of mine," added Bibbins, blushing. "I want to put it on my"l should think you would." murmured the Girl with pale lips—it was the very best she could do. But Bibbins seemed to find no lack in it. He turned, with his glowing face, to the door again, and helped the Girl over the mat when she would have stumbled. Then, in the dark ha'i, htf entiHisud to her the. dressmakers gold thimble, and the pork butcher's clerk's tie, and* Buster's Teddy-bear.

"You see, I won't be here." he said, "so you won't mind seeing they get to their proper places at table!- I goes,* Buster's ought to sit. on top of his stocking."

The Girl graveiy agreed. "Good wight," said Mr Bibbin^—he was putting out his hand —"and I wish you, though it's a bit early, a merry Christmas—the best," he added, looking down at her. "you've ever known!" His voice had grown kind. The Girl, with the Teddy-l>ear in her' arms, smiled mistily. She hum, for Bibbins' sake, hanging the flags out! "Good-night," she said, "and—and I wish you—happiness—with all my heart !"

"Oh. I say—" said Mr Bibbins, blushing. He did seem about to saymore, but he only looked at the Girl again, and wrung her hand' hastily, and murmuring something that sounded very much like a husky "God bless you!" he retreated precipitately down the hall.

The Christmas dinner did get cooked. And there was a lot of jollity; but Pansy had tied a red ribbon and <=prig of hotly on Mr Bibbins' chair, and the Girl did' not dare look at it for fear she would have to haul her flags down.

The clock, at Mrs M'Queons' right hand was, she said, "that heart-felt in its ticking out Bibbins' absence that she just couldn't enjoy her cranberry sauce!" The thin dressmaker, when she thought, no one was looking, had hastily tucked the gold thimble into her breast. It was only, perhaps, to the pork butcher's clerk that Bibbins' present was —just a present. Miss Connors, with two theatre tickets for the best show In town directed to her in Bibbins' handwriting, sniffed audibly; "Orchestra chairs at two dollars per—just as if I was a dead swell! Ain't that like Bibbins 0 When I'd have been tickled foolish with the balcony!" 'The Girl buried her faeo, just here, in a. bunch of hothouse violets; they were to her, with Bibbins' modest card, the whole of Christinas! All the same she couldn't eat her dinner. Miss Connors, it seemed, also know about the ring! "He showed it to me," she said across the table, "while ho was strapping his suit case in the bail —and never a word, when I teta~d him, except that it was for the best little woman in the world, and he did not care if all the world knew it! And you can bet," added Pansv, "though I'm not in love with him. that I nulled red-hot jealous! To have a thing I like that going on in Bibbins' life and none of us knew it! But I knew," ended Miss Connors fiercely, "whal that, managership would lead to, believe me —1 knew it would lead Bibbins straight into getting married!" "I'm sure," said Mrs MQuoon lenderly. "it's up to all of us to wisli him and the young ladv every happiness—" But the Girl couldn't have stayed another minute. She turned so suddenly faint at the thought of Bibbins going away and getting married *.hat she could barely stammer an excuse about the plum pudding; and somehow got out fit' that cheerful, friendly dming-room—-then she fled hastily %n the stairs. She had it out with hfTsolf in the I'ttle hall room. With Pansy's bottle o» Sicilian Violet on her bare dresser, and Mrs M'Queen's jar oi homemade preserve, done up in red crop" paper, and the little dressmaker's lacquered box of r»ins, the Girl, hugging Bibbins' Christmas flowers, told herself humbly that life was good, and hearts were kind, and this, after long wandering, home! And she prayed a little wordlpsn pramr that God might, make her wortbv—she had just hoarded tip all th« sad things and the bitter thing*, and given them out to the wor 1 '! as Bibh-'ns hod given his brightness. What matter if early to-morrow morning she must tramp the streets looking lor another

dreti, and>—Pansy Connors' and porkbutcher's clerks.' Here the Girl, smiling through warm tears, stopped. What surprised her whs that suddenly she was finding that she loved all of them, these dear, common people, who in lesser ways than Bibbins' very heavenly one had taken her in. and made her "one ot the family."

The Girl, when she had reached this point, did something that she had beeu wanting to do for a long, long timeonly she could not be sure. Now she was sure. She went over and got out of her trunk a thin packet of letters and a Man's photograph, and still with that warm tearful light in her eyes, lit a match, and', holding them'over the wash-basin, burned them one by one.

It was the (iiri's victory over herself. There were voices downstairs, and Buster's baby laugh. The Girl remembered, then, that it Was Christmas, and that she, who had been too poor to give anything, might yet give herself. So she bathed her eyes, and pinned on Bibb'.ns' violets, and went down and played with Busier for a mil two hours, that his mother might run out to the eenioteiy with holly for the letter-car-rier's grave.

After that, she helped the dressmaker, put in a lew stitches on a dress to be tinished that night for a Christmas party. And then —there are so many little things turning up when one is in t-aru'st about-v|Jnaking other people happy, she lonnd .something to do in tho kitchen. Pansy was there, urging Mrs M'Queen to go with her to the show.

The Girl, standing in the doorway, paused. "Oh, do go," she said, "and—and I'll get the tea!" "Good Lord!" said Pansy, and stand at the (iiri's earnest face. "Now what do you know about that!" cried Mrs M'Queen. "Don't it beat all how full folks are id' kindness?"

The (rirl went over and put one arm swiftly alwut Mrs M'Queen \s neck. "Please go," she said. "You work so hard for us all, and you can take your time to dress while I make muffins! I'd love to make muffins!"

"Bless you, deare," said Mrs M'Queen, "It's that tired of cooking I am! But honest. Pansy. I ain't got a rag to wear!" But let .Miss Connors alone for a thing liki- that! She just fussed Mrs M'Queen up till she looked like a bird of Paradise in borrowed plumage, while the Girl, still with that little smiling light in her eyes, got the Christmas supper.

She was just washing up the dishes when she heard a key in the door upstairs; the next, minute she stood face to face with —Bibbins! "Hello," he said cheerfully. "Buster's mother told me you were down here, so 1 came right down." The Girl, dropping the dish-towel, stood very still. He said it just as if it had been a very important thing—finding her.

"I say," said Bibbins, "I —was hoping you'd be a little glad, vou know !" "Glad!" bivathed the Girl. "1 planned it for a surprise." he said. He came two or three steps nearer. "You see, I gave Christmas Eve to my mother; but I had to keep a part of the day for—you and me!"

Tlie Girl said something br athlessh

"Vou have been—in Vermont!" He nodded. "I wantod, you know, to put that ring on my mother's hand myself!" Behind his glasses his honest gray *yos were making the Girl some very srx'e.al appeal. "Vou see," he •-aid, "it stood for a lot more to both of us than just—a ring." and then be added: "Years atto, when I was a Httle shaver, and there were four of us to look after, she took off the one my father had given her and sold it to buy US shoes." "Oh!" said the Girl.

"That's why," said Bibbins, : T made a promise to myself some day to put a mightly good one back there, on the •hand that had 1 grown worn for us boys.!' His face lit up. "She thought it great," he sad. "Oh," said the Girl, '"you are great!" There was a moment's silegice. Through it the Girl could hear her own heart beating, but she was most conscious of Bibbins' eyes. —they seemed to he reaching down into the deep places of her soul! Bibbins camo slowly across the kitchen floor. "I'd like to tell you something," he said. "I'm just—dead in love with you, Little Girl!"

But the Girl, staring up at him, could not speak, 'it's been, said Bibbins. somehow getting hold of her hand, "that way with me for a long time. Do you mind ?" "Mindr" choked the Girl. She had a queer feeling that Bibbins was some dear archangel coming to lead her straight into a new kind of Paradise! "Mind?" she echoed., and could get no further —she just floated in the beautiful tenderness that swept to her from Bibbins' eves.

Bibbins, holding her fluttering little hand closo in his big firm one, was reaching with the. other into the black depths of his vest pocket. "I —I bought two rings!" said Bibbins happily. "It —it didn't seem to matter that I was taking a chance —I just had to buy two of 'em, that's all. I just hoped hard you me down!"

He was touching the spring of a tiny leather case as he spoke, and there it rested —a clear white diamond! The Girl, looking at it, felt that all the dross of life had been burned away — into this!

"I had a kind of feeling about it," said Bibbins, "that I'd like to— to put my mother's on first, just to show her that I hadn't forgotten, and that her wrinked old hand was beautiful to me still. But I bought yours," paid. Bibbins, "on the very day I got my raise." His face, flushed with sudden earnestness, was turned squarely to the Girl's —"And if you'll wear it,'' ho said, "Little Girl," I'll do my best, to make every day of your life a happy one-" But the Girl, at the vision of all that Bibbins' "best" would mean to her, caught his hand. She was pressing her hot cheek against, it. as if she could never lose its strength, or its nearness, and under her breath, in the shabby old homely kitchen she was speaking from her verv soul:

"My dear —my dear —!" the Girl got that, far, and then could not go on for tears; but they were happy tears, for Bibbins had suddenly folded her in his arms.