“But Granny is there,” Keith protested.

“Yes, of course, and you must be nice to her, but....”

As his mother did not go on, Keith asked:  “Why does Granny always stay in the kitchen?”

“Because she wants to,” his mother answered.

“But why does she want to?”

“It is her way—­a sort of pride she has.  And I have long ago given up trying to persuade her.”

Her tone indicated clearly that further discussion of the subject was not desirable.

X

Keith was playing in his own corner that very evening, trying to keep as quiet as possible while his father had an unusually late dinner.  His mother had gone out into the kitchen a few moments earlier.  Thence she returned suddenly with a half empty bottle in her hand and a look of extreme annoyance on her face.

“Carl,” she said, “look what I just found in a corner of the cupboard.”

“Humph,” the father grunted with a sideglance at the bottle.  “Ours is locked up, is it not?”

“Yes, but that is neither here nor there.  She would rather die, she says, than touch a drop of ours.”

“Where does she get it?”

“I can’t make it out.  Somebody must bring it in, of course.  I fear it is Mrs. Karlgren, and I am simply going to tell her to keep away hereafter.  The idea of her coming here practically begging, and then doing such a thing, after all I have done for her!”

“But you are not sure,” the father objected earnestly, and Keith paid special notice to his objection because he had already learned, or divined, that his father could not bear the sight of the poor woman in question.

“No, it is impossible to be sure,” the mother admitted.  Then she added after a pause:  “What puzzles me more than anything else is where she gets the money.”

Though no name was mentioned, Keith knew perfectly well that they were speaking of Granny.  And he recalled having laughed at her in the kitchen earlier in the evening before the father came home.  Her eyes had a funny look and seemed a little inflamed.  Her still thick braids were loosened and about to come entirely undone.  She was talking more than usual and in a tone that suggested defiance.

As he recalled all this, Keith forgot to listen to his parents, who went on discussing so intently that he was able to leave his corner and reach the door to the kitchen unnoticed.  An irresistible desire to see Granny at once had seized him.  Back of it lay a vaguely sensed mixture of curiosity and sympathy.

Granny was in her favourite place beside the kitchen sofa, seated on a footstool almost as large as an ordinary chair, but somewhat lower.  That stool was the one bone of contention between her and Keith, because he was carrying it off as often as he could get at it.  Turned upside down, with Keith seated snugly between its four legs, it became a sleigh drawn across icy plains by a team of swift reindeer, or a ship rocking mightily on the high seas.