“Oh, Sally,” said she, “how came this here?”

“Why,” returned Sally, hitting it a jog, “I don’t sleep any now, and I thought the nights would seem shorter, if I had this to rock and make believe little Willie was in it.  So I brought it down from the garret, and it affords me a sight of comfort, I assure you!”

Mary afterwards learned that often during the long winter nights the sound of that cradle could be heard, occasionally drowned by Sally’s voice, which sometimes rose almost to a shriek, and then died away in a low, sad wail, as she sang a lullaby to the “Willie who lay sleeping on the prairie at the West.”

As there was now no reason why she should not do so, Mary accompanied Jenny home, where, as she had expected, she met with a cool reception from Rose, who merely nodded to her, and then resumed the book she was reading.  After tea, Mary stepped for a moment into the yard, and then Rose asked Jenny what she intended doing with her “genteel visitor.”

“Put her in the best chamber, and sleep there myself,” said Jenny, adding that “they were going to lie awake all night just to see how it seemed.”

But in spite of this resolution, as midnight advanced Jenny found that Mary’s answers, even when Billy Bender was the topic, became more and more unsatisfactory, and finally ceased altogether.  Concluding to let her sleep a few minutes, and then wake her up, Jenny turned on her pillow and when her eyes again opened, the morning sun was shining through the half-closed shutters, and the breakfast bell was jingling in the lower hall.

When Mary returned to the poor-house, she found a new arrival in the person of Mrs. Perkins!  The widow had hailed Mike as he passed her house the day before, and on learning how matters stood, offered to accompany him home.  Mike, who had an eye for “fancy-looking girls,” did not exactly like Mrs. Perkins’ appearance.  Besides that, his orders were to bring Mary, and he had no idea of taking another as a substitute.  Accordingly, when on his return from Mrs. Mason’s, he saw the widow standing at her gate, all equipped with parasol and satchel, he whipped up his horse, and making the circuit of the school-house, was some ways down the road ere the widow suspected his intentions.  “Thanking her stars” (her common expression) “that she had a good pair of feet,” Mrs. Perkins started on foot, reaching the poor-house about sunset.  She was now seated in what had been Mrs. Parker’s room, and with pursed-up lips, and large square collar very much like the present fashion, was stitching away upon the shroud, heaving occasionally a long-drawn sigh, as she thought how lonely and desolate poor Mr. Parker must feel!

“Will you give me some work?” asked Mary, after depositing her bonnet upon the table.

“There’s nothing for you,” returned Mrs. Perkins.  “I can do all that is necessary, and prefer working alone.”

“Yes, she shall help too, if she wants to,” snapped out Mrs. Grundy, with one of her old shoulder jerks.  “Mary’s handy with the needle, for I larnt her myself.”