“Find out what?” The President asked it fearfully.

“Find out—­find out—­” droned the voice, monotonously.

The President sat up very straight in his chair.  “The children—­the children.”  He remembered now—­they were the children from the incurable ward at Saint Margaret’s.

He sank back with a feeling of great helplessness, and closed his eyes again.  And there he sat, immovable, his finger still marking his place in the report of the United Charities.

The Oldest Trustee sat alone, knitting comforters for the Preventorium patients.  Like many another elderly person, her usual retiring hour was later than that of the younger members of her household, undoubtedly due to the frequent cat-naps snatched from the evening.

The Oldest Trustee had a habit of knitting the day’s events in with her yarn.  What she had done and said and heard were all thought over again to the rhythmic click of her needles.  And the results at the end of the evening were usually a finished comforter and a comfortable feeling.  This night, however, the knitting lagged and the thoughts were unaccountably dissatisfying; she could not even settle down to a cat-nap with the habitual serenity.

“I don’t know why I should feel disturbed,” and the Oldest Trustee prodded her yarn ball with a disquieting needle, “but I certainly miss the usual gratification of a day well spent.”

She closed her eyes, hoping thereby to lose herself for the space of a moment, but instead—­ She was startled to hear voices at her very elbow; a number of persons must have entered the room, but how they could have done so without her knowing it she could not understand.  Of course they thought her asleep; it was just as well to let them think so.  She really felt too tired to talk.

“Mother’s undoubtedly growing old.  Have you noticed how much she naps in the evening, now?” It was the voice of her youngest daughter.

“I heard her telling some one the other day she was five years younger than she is.  That’s a sure sign,” and her son laughed an amused little chuckle.

“I can tell you a surer one.”  This time it was her oldest daughter—­her first-born.  “Haven’t you noticed how all mother’s little peculiarities are growing on her?  She is getting so much more dictatorial and preachy.  Of course, we know that mother means to be kind and helpful, but she has always been so—­tactless—­and blunt; and it’s growing worse and worse.”

“I have often wondered how all her charity people take her; it must come tough on them, sometimes.  Gee!  Can’t you see her raising those lorgnettes of hers and saying, ‘My good boy, do you read your Bible?’ or, ’My little girl, I hope you remember to be grateful for all you receive.’  Say, wouldn’t you hate to have charity stuffed down your throat that way?” and the oldest and favorite grandson groaned out his feelings.