"You will be glad to know, Jennie, that I have persuaded mother to spend the night with us," Margaret said
"She never stops the night with us, Margaret," Jennie coldly returned. "Come on, Mom, I'll put you on the street car."
"But isn't it nice," cried Margaret, holding her arm around Mrs. Leitzel to keep Jennie off, "that I've succeeded in coaxing her to stay to-night? Such a pleasant surprise for Daniel when he comes home, to find you here, dear! What is home without a grandmother? Good discipline for Daniel, too, to have to give up this armchair for one evening! Even I have to get out of it when he wants it. But naturally he can't put his mother out of the only really comfortable chair in the house."
"But Danny paid for that chair," explained Sadie. "It would be funny—ain't?—if he couldn't sit in his own chair when he wants!"
"The spare-room bed ain't made up," Jennie frowned at Margaret. "And nobody has time to make it up at four o'clock on Saturday afternoon! Anyhow, strangers stopping over night is apt to give Sadie the headache. And Mom never wants to be away from her own bed. She won't can home herself in a strange bed, can you, Mom?"
But Margaret spoke before Mrs. Leitzel could reply. "I'll make up the guest bed. It won't take me ten minutes. Mother"—she patted Mrs. Leitzel's shoulder—"I'll be right downstairs again in ten minutes."
But Mrs. Leitzel clung to her hand. "Don't let me alone with—stay by me, Margaret——" she pitifully pleaded.
"You shall come upstairs with me, then, to my room," Margaret said, helping her, now, to rise to her feet.
"No, Margaret, Mom's to go back on the five o'clock train," affirmed Jennie peremptorily. "Our Danny give her the money to go back. It ain't for you to be using our clean linens to make up the spare bed. Come on, Mom."
Jennie laid an ungentle grasp upon her step-mother's arm, but Margaret, her face suddenly ablaze with indignation, confronted her.