The details of our stay in Chicago as a whole would be uninteresting, and I would not weary the reader with them.  Hal improved so rapidly that on the fourth day after our arrival, he was carried in comparative comfort to Mr. Hanson’s residence, and placed for a few days in a pleasant chamber to gather strength for our journey home.  One little incident I must tell you, connected with my introduction to Mr. Hanson’s family.  We were seated at the supper table, talking of Hal, his sickness and the cause of it, when Daisy, a five-year-old daughter, spoke quickly, “Mamma, mamma, she looks just like the ‘tree lady,’ only she don’t have her sewing.”

I did not realize it as the child spoke, but when Mrs. Hanson chided the little one, saying, “Daisy must learn not to tell all her little thoughts,” it all came so clearly, and I trembled visibly; yes, I guess it was rather more than visible, since an unfortunate tilt in my chair, an involuntary effort of trying to poise brain and body at once, upset cup and saucer and plate, and before I knew it Mrs. Hanson had deluged me with bay rum.  They said I nearly fainted, but I realized nothing save the ludicrous figure I presented, and I thought desparingly “Emily did it.”  After supper I went to the library, and there it was—­this piece of work which Hal had done, representing me sitting under that old apple tree, hemming and thinking.  It was so perfectly done, even to the plain ring on my middle finger, a wide old-fashioned ring which had been my grandmother Minot’s, and bore the initials “E.M.”  I could not speak when I saw it, and if I could I should not have dared to for fear of some unfortunate expression.  I wished in my heart it had been any one else but me.

“If my face had been like Hal’s,” I thought, and I stood as one covered with a mantle and bound by its heavy folds, until the gentle voice of Mrs. Hanson roused me, saying: 

“Take a seat, Miss Minot, you are very tired.”  Yes, I was tired, though I did not know it, and taking the chair she proffered, I covered my face with both my hands and drew long breaths, as if to deliver myself from the thoughts which overwhelmed me.  Mrs. Hanson’s womanly nature divined my feelings, and she left me to myself, but after a while Daisy drew an Ottoman near, and seating herself on it put her little hands in mine and whispered: 

“I think you’re awful pretty.  Don’t you?”

I drew her into my lap and kissed her, and my dreams that night were hope and peace.  Louis was with me there, and although constantly attentive to Hal, he gave no signs of weariness, and Hal would look into his eyes, as he sat beside him, with a look of perfect devotion.  I thought so many times, as he lay back among his pillows looking at Louis, he was mentally casting his features, and how nice it would be when his deft hands moulded the clay with face and form like that of our beautiful Louis Desmonde.  What a joy to Clara’s heart, and my own would beat