"Sakes! Not again? Well, where shall I begin?"
"Oh, at the very beginning," answered Donald; and Dorothy's eager, expressive nod said the same thing.
"Well," began Lydia, "about fourteen years ago—"
"No, no, not there, please, but 'way, away back as far as you can remember; farther back than you ever told us before."
"Well," and Lydia proceeded to select a fresh apple and peel it slowly and deliberately; "well, I was once a young chit of a girl, and I came to this house to live with your Aunt Kate. She wasn't any aunt then, not a bit of it, but a sweet, pretty, perky, lady-girl as ever was; and she had" (here Liddy looked sad, and uttered a low "Dear, dear! how strange it seems!")—"she had two splendid brothers, Mr. George Reed and Mr. Wolcott Reed (your papa, you know). Oh, she was the sweetest young lady you ever set eyes on! Well, they all lived here in this very house,—your grandpa and grandma had gone to the better world a few years before,—and Master G. was sort of head of the family, you see, as the oldest son ought to be."
Donald unconsciously sat more erect on his bench, and thrust his feet farther forward on the carpet.
"Yes, Master G. was the head," Liddy went on, "but you wouldn't have known it, they were all so united and loving-like. Miss Kate, though kind of quick, was just too sweet and good for anything,—'the light of the house,' as the young master called her, and—"
"YOU'VE HER SHINING DARK HAIR, MASTER DONALD," SAID LIDDY