“No,” said Mrs. Higbee, “I—­I —­fact is, I’m kinder frightened.  I—­fact is, Mrs. Louder, I guess I’ll tell you, though I don’t know you very well; but I’ve known about you so long—­ I run away and didn’t tell ’em.  I just couldn’t stay way from Liza.  And I took the bird—­for the children; and it’s my bird, and I was ’fraid Minnie would forget to feed it and it would be lonesome.  My children are awful kind good children, but they don’t understand.  And if Solon sees me he will want me to go back.  I know I’m dretful foolish; and Solon and Minnie will make me see I am.  There won’t be no good reason for me to go, and I’ll have to stay; and I feel as if I should fly—­Oh, massy sakes! there’s Solon coming down the street ——­”

She ran a few steps in half a dozen ways, then fluttered back to her bag and her cage.

“Well,” said Mrs. Louder, drawing herself up to her full height, “you shall go if you want to.”

“Solon will find me, he’ll know the bird-cage!  Oh, dear!  Oh, dear!”

Then a most unexpected helper stepped upon the stage.  What is the mysterious instinct of rebellion to authority that, nine cases out of ten, sends us to the aid of a fugitive?  Tilly, the unconscious despot of her own mother, promptly aided and abetted Solon’s rebel mother in her flight.

“Not if I carry it,” said she, snatching up the bird-cage; “run inside that den where they sell refreshments; he’ll see me and go somewhere else.”

It fell out precisely as she planned.  They heard Solon demanding a lady with a bird-cage of the agent; they heard the agent’s reply, given with official indifference, “There she is, inside.”  Directly, Solon, a small man with an anxious mien, ran into the waiting-room, flung a glance of disappointment at Tilly, and ran out again.

Tilly went to her client.  “Did he look like he was anxious?” was the mother’s greeting.  “Oh, I just know he and Minnie will be hunting me everywhere.  Maybe I had better go home, ’stead of to Baxter.”

“No, you hadn’t,” said Tilly, with decision.  “Mother’s going to Baxter, too, and if you like, minnit you’re safely off, I’ll go tell your folks.”

“You’re real kind, I’d be ever so much obliged.  And you don’t mind your ma travelling alone? ain’t that nice for her!” She seemed much cheered by the prospect of company and warmed into confidences.

“I am kinder lonesome, sometimes, that’s a fact,” said she, “and I kinder wish I lived in a block or a flat like your ma.  You see, Minnie teaches in the public school and she’s away all day, and she don’t like to have me make company of the hired girl, though she’s a real nice girl.  And there ain’t nothing for me to do, and I feel like I wasn’t no use any more in the world.  I remember that’s what our old minister in Ohio said once.  He was a real nice old man; and they had thought everything of him in the parish; but he got old and his sermons