“Now let’s go up and look at the guest-rooms.”  Ellen led the way, an engaging figure in a fresh white morning dress, her cheeks glowing with colour like a girl’s.

“If you didn’t know, would you ever dream she had been wife and widow, and had lost her little son?” murmured Winifred in Martha’s ear.

Martha Macauley shook her head.  “She seems to have gone back and begun all over again.  Yet there’s a look—­”

Winifred nodded.  “Of course there is—­a look she wouldn’t have had if she hadn’t gone through so much.  It’s given her such a rich sort of bloom.”

The guest-rooms were airy, attractive, chintz-hung rooms, one large, one somewhat smaller, but both wearing a hospitable look of readiness.

“I like the gray-and-rose room best,” announced Winifred, after a critical survey, as if she were inspecting both rooms for the first time instead of the fortieth.  She had made the gray-and-rose chintz hangings herself, delighting in each exquisite yard of the fine imported material.

“I prefer the green-leaf pattern, it looks so cool and fresh.”  Martha eyed details admiringly.  “This is your bachelor’s room, you say, Ellen?  Oh, you’ve put a desk in it!  The bachelor will want to stay forever.  Who do you suppose he will be?”

“The first friend of Red’s who comes.  He says he’s always wanted to ask certain ones, and never had a place to put them, except at the hotel.”

“He’d better be careful whom he asks—­now.  They’ll all fall in love with you.  By the way, do you know Red has a terribly jealous streak?” Winifred glanced quickly at Ellen as she spoke.

“No—­what nonsense!  How do you like my idea of a book-shelf by the bed, and a drop-light?”

“Pampering—­pure pampering of your bachelors.  You’ll never be rid of them.  But he can be jealous, Ellen.”

“What makes you think so?  I never saw a trace of it,” cried Martha Macauley.

“It’s there—­you mark my words.  He couldn’t help it—­with his hair and eyes.”

Ellen laughed.  “Hair and eyes!  What about my black locks and eyes?  Shall I not make a trustful wife, because I happen to have them?  Oh!”—­she ran to the window—­“there comes the Imp!  You’ll excuse me if I run down?  Red’s been away all night and all morning.”

She disappeared as the Green Imp’s horn vociferated a signal of greeting from far down the road.

“They’ll never get time to grow tired of each other,” commented Martha, as the two friends descended the old-time winding staircase.  “Isn’t this old hall delightful, now?  I never realized the possibilities of the house, with this part closed so long.”

“One more peep at the living-room, and then we’ll go.  Isn’t it just like Ellen?  Such a charming, quiet room, without the least bit of ostentation, yet simply breathing beauty and refinement.  She is the most wonderful shopper I know.  She made every dollar Red furnished go twice as far as I could.  I don’t suppose he would let her spend a penny of her own on this house.”