closet is intended for your shoes only. Will you be so good as to make a note of these things?" 

 "Yes, Grandmother." 

 Ink, candle grease, wash basket—what did they matter in the scheme of life, with spring tapping at the window? With a huge effort Joan forced back a wild burst of insurrection, and remained standing in what she hoped was the correct attitude of a properly repentant child. "How long can I stand it?" she cried inwardly. "How long before I smash things and make a dash for freedom?" 

 "Now go back and finish reading to your grand father." 

 And once more, trembling with anger and mortification, the girl picked her way over the limp and indifferent skins, took up the paper and sat down. Once more her clear, fresh voice, this time with a little quiver in it, fitted in to the regular tick of the querulous clock, the near-by chatter of birds' tongues and the hiss of burning logs. 

 The prim old lady, who had in her time borne a wonderful resemblance to the girl whom she watched so closely,—even to the chestnut-brown hair and the tip-tilted nose, the full lips, the round chin and the spirit that at any moment might urge her to break away from discipline,—retired to carry on her daily tour of inspection; and the old man stood again with his back to the fire to listen impatiently and with a futile jealousy to the deeds and misdeeds of an ever-young and ever-active world. 

 

 II 

 Joan was thankful when lunch was over, and murmured "Amen" to grace with a fervor that would have surprised an unimaginative and unobservant person. Like all the meals in that pompous dining-room, it was a form of torture to a young thing bubbling with health and high spirits, who was not supposed to speak unless directly addressed and was obliged to hold herself in check while her grandparents progressed slowly and deliberately through a menu of medically thought-out dishes. Both the old people were on a rigid diet, and mostly the conversation between them consisted of grumbles at having to dally with baby-food and reminiscences of the admirable dinners of the past. An aged butler and a footman in the sere and yellow only added to the general Rip van Winklism, and the presence of two very old dogs, one the grandfather's Airedale and the other Mrs. Ludlow's Irish terrier, with a white nose and rusty gray coat, did nothing to dispel the depression. The six full-length portraits in oils 

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