"I have a few odds and ends of things," was his reply; "but most of what you see belongs to my nephew, Mark Osborne. A great-aunt left him her property when she died, this house, and a good deal of what Mark himself disrespectfully calls plunder."
"You have never told us about the Toby jug," put in Frances. "Does that belong to Mark?"
"No, that is my own, and sometime I'll tell you all I know about it; but now we want to hear Miss Sherwin's story. That is the first business of the evening;" and, his guests being seated to his satisfaction, the Spectacle Man crossed his knees and prepared to listen.
"I am not sure that it is at all interesting," said the young lady, as all eyes turned toward her. "Shall I read it or tell it?"
"Tell it, please," cried the children in a chorus.
So she began, at first a little timidly, and with a glance now and then at her paper, but gaining courage as she went on.
"I have called it," she said, "'The Story of the Missing Bridge.'
"Once upon a time a young man set out on a journey. The tender beauty of the springtime was upon the grass and trees, the wheat fields were turning from gold to rose, and the sky was a soft, deep blue.
"He was a sturdy young fellow and carried a light heart, as one could tell from the smile in his eyes and the merry tune he whistled as he strode along. And he had reason to be happy, for on the next day at sunset he was to be married to the fairest girl in all the country round.
"After a time the path he followed left the open fields and entered the cool, dim forest, where all was so still and peaceful that involuntarily he changed his tune to one more grave.