I washed the milk pans three or four times over that night, and was about carrying them into the "best room," when mother said,
"Why, Emily, we keep our milk pans in the buttery."
"Oh!" I said, turning suddenly and letting my pans fall and scatter. And when I picked them up and collected my senses, I thought, "I cannot tell mother to-night after all, Hal will stay with us." When things were at last in their places, I sauntered out through the lane in the beautiful moonlight, and coming back met Hal who took my hand in his and whispered,
"Tell mother to-morrow, please, I want to go away next month and some things are necessary to be done."
"Have you told father yet?"
"No, but he will not care."
"Father will care," I replied, "but you know since his misfortune, and his conclusion that he cannot do anything but carry on the farm, he seems to have lost his sprightly step and his cheery ways of old."
"Well, Emily," said Hal, "I am no help to him on the farm, and could not be if I tried, and the work I am doing now is anything but satisfying to me."
Then the thought occurred to me, I had no idea of what the boy desired to accomplish, and the question what would you do Hal? was answered in this wise—
"Wait till I've been away six months."