I don’t see much of Father.  Still, there’s something kind of queer about it, after all.  He only speaks to me about twice a day—­just “Good-morning, Mary,” and “Good-night.”  And so far as most of his actions are concerned you wouldn’t think by them that he knew I was in the house, Yet, over and over again at the table, and at times when I didn’t even know he was ’round, I’ve found him watching me, and with such a queer, funny look in his eyes.  Then, very quickly always, he looks right away.

But last night he didn’t.  And that’s especially what I wanted to write about to-day.  And this is the way it happened.

It was after supper, and I had gone into the library.  Father had gone out to the observatory as usual, and Aunt Jane had gone upstairs to her room as usual, and as usual I was wandering ’round looking for something to do.  I wanted to play on the piano, but I didn’t dare to—­not with all those dead-hair and wax-flower folks in the parlor watching me, and the chance of Father’s coming in as he did before.

I was standing in the window staring out at nothing—­it wasn’t quite dark yet—­when again I had that queer feeling that somebody was looking at me.  I turned—­and there was Father.  He had come in and was sitting in the big chair by the table.  But this time he didn’t look right away as usual and give me a chance to slip quietly out of the room, as I always had before.  Instead he said: 

“What are you doing there, Mary?”

“N-nothing.”  I know I stammered.  It always scares me to talk to Father.

“Nonsense!” Father frowned and hitched in his chair.  Father always hitches in his chair when he’s irritated and nervous.  “You can’t be doing nothing.  Nobody but a dead man does nothing—­and we aren’t so sure about him.  What are you doing, Mary?”

“Just l-looking out the window.”

“Thank you.  That’s better.  Come here.  I want to talk to you.”

“Yes, Father.”

I went, of course, at once, and sat down in the chair near him.  He hitched again in his seat.

“Why don’t you do something—­read, sew, knit?” he demanded.  “Why do I always find you moping around, doing nothing?”

Just like that he said it; and when he had just told me—­

“Why, Father!” I cried; and I know that I showed how surprised I was.  “I thought you just said I couldn’t do nothing—­that nobody could!”

“Eh?  What?  Tut, tut!” He seemed very angry at first; then suddenly he looked sharply into my face.  Next, if you’ll believe it, he laughed—­the queer little chuckle under his breath that I’ve heard him give two or three times when there was something he thought was funny.  “Humph!” he grunted.  Then he gave me another sharp look out of his eyes, and said:  “I don’t think you meant that to be quite so impertinent as it sounded, Mary, so we’ll let it pass—­this time.  I’ll put my question this way:  Don’t you ever knit or read or sew?”