Willy was privately afraid she would not be ready when the village coach came, and so they would miss the train, but he said nothing.  He stood patiently in the door and looked down the street whence the coach would come, and listened to the bustle in Grandma’s room.  There was not an impatient line in his face although he had really a good deal at stake.  He was going to Exeter with his Grandpa and Grandma, to visit his aunt Annie, and his new uncle Frank.  Grandpa and Grandma had come from Maine to visit their daughter Ellen who was Willy’s mother, and now they were going to see Annie.  When Willy found out that he was going too, he was delighted.  He had always been very fond of his aunt Annie, and had not seen her for a long time.  He had never seen his new uncle Frank who had been married to Annie six months before, and he looked forward to that.  Uncles and aunts seemed a very desirable acquisition to this little Willy, who had always been a great pet among his relatives.

“He won’t make you a bit of trouble, if you don’t mind taking him.  He never teases nor frets, and he won’t be homesick,” his mother had told his grandmother.

“I know all about that,” Grandma Stockton had replied.  “I’d just as soon take him as a doll-baby.”

[Illustration:  WATCHING FOR THE COACH.]

Willy Norton really was a very sweet boy.  He proved it this morning by standing there so patiently and never singing out, “Ain’t you most ready, Grandma?” although it did seem to him she never would be.

His mother was helping her pack too; he could hear them talking.  “I guess I sha’n’t put in father’s best coat,” Grandma Stockton remarked, among other things.  “He won’t be in Exeter over Sunday, and won’t want it to go to meetin’, and it musses it up so to put it in a valise.”

“Well, I don’t know as I would as long as you’re coming back here,” said his mother.

After a while she remarked further, “If father should want that coat, you can send for it, and I can put in Willy’s other shoes with it.”

Willy noticed that, because he himself had rather regretted not taking his other shoes.  He had only his best ones, and he thought he might want to go berrying in Exeter and would spoil them tramping through the bushes and briers, and he did not like to wear shabby shoes.

“Well, I can; but I guess he won’t want it,” said Grandma.

At last the coach came in sight, and Grandma was all ready excepting her bonnet and gloves, and Grandpa had only to brush his hat very carefully and put it on; so they did not miss the train.

Willy’s mother hugged him tight and kissed him.  There were tears in her eyes.  This was the first time he had ever been away from home without her.  “Be a good boy,” said she.

“There isn’t any need of tellin’ him that,” chuckled Grandpa, getting into the coach.  He thought Willy was the most wonderful child in the world.