“A good old-fashioned chicken dinner,” Mrs. Quigley said with appreciation. “And pumpkin pie!” Grandpa Dally added with a chuckle.
“It’s a good while since I ate any home cookin’,” Mr. Quigley remarked. “I tell you, folks, there’s nothin’ like a home, whether it’s for cookin’ or just livin’ in,” he added wistfully, and every one knew that he was thinking of the poorhouse.
Then Miss Grackle impulsively exclaimed, “Dan Quigley, you seem about as strong as ever. I should think that you could get gardening to do.”
“I’ve tried, Sally, but all the farmers say I’m too old,” Mr. Quigley replied.
“You are too old for hard farming, I agree,” Miss Grackle said, “but maybe there is some one who has a garden and grounds to be cared for, where you could work when you felt like it and rest when you were tired.”
“I wish there was such a place,” the old man said sadly, “but there ain’t.”
“Yes, there is, too,” Miss Grackle exclaimed. “I want this place of mine fixed up the way it was when father was alive, and I want you and Mrs. Quigley to come and live in this cottage and take care of it for me.”
Mrs. Quigley’s eyes were shining. “Pa Quigley,” she said, “I always told you the dear Lord would send one of His angels to deliver us from the poorhouse, if it was right that we should be delivered.”
“And so He has!” Mr. Quigley said in a shaking voice. “And Sally Grackle is that angel!”
How Miss Grackle longed to tell them that Adele Doring and her six friends were really the angels, but she had promised Adele that she would not. When at last the guests took their departure they left the happy old couple in a really, truly home.