"Over here," repeated Miss Hester, standing up, and Ruth saw her figure dimly in the gloom.
She picked her way along with more assurance as her eyes became accustomed to the half light.
"Miss Amanda wanted me to be sure to tell you that there is to be a meeting of the mothers this afternoon at the minister's house and you mustn't forget to come, she says. You are just the same as a mother, Billy's and mine, aren't you, Aunt Hester?"
"I hope so," returned Miss Hester groping among the bundles in the chest before which she was kneeling. "There, this is what I am looking for."
"Oh, what a cunning little hood," said Ruth picking up a soft cashmere affair, trimmed with swansdown. "Was it yours when you were a little girl, Aunt Hester?"
"No, all these things belonged to my little sister Henrietta. They have been in this chest ever since she died. My mother put them there with her own hands."
"Oh." Ruth leaned over to look more closely at the neat piles of garments. Miss Hester sat on the floor and pushed back a lock of hair which had fallen over her eyes. She was a tall, slender woman with dark hair, hazel eyes and a sad expression about the mouth.
"Were they all Henrietta's?" asked Ruth with interest. "Aunt Hester, if you had had a little girl you would have named her Henrietta, wouldn't you?"
Miss Hester smiled. "Very likely."
"'Most everybody calls me Ruth Brackenbury, don't they? Do you like to have them call me that, Aunt Hester?"