She liked to come to our house better than to any other.  We also were poor.  My Aunt Abby was a woman of great simplicity, and a quiet, stately humility, like Miss Penstock’s own; and they enjoyed sitting side by side whole days, sewing in silence.  Miss Penstock had always spoken with a certain sort of tender reverence to Nat, and I remembered that he liked to be in the room where she sewed.  All these thoughts passed through my mind in a moment.  I sprang to my feet and exclaimed, ‘That is it—­that is it!’ and I ran hastily down to the study.  Miss Penstock was alone there.  She looked up in surprise at my breathlessness and my red eyes.  I knelt down by her side and took the work out of her hands.

“‘Dear Miss Penstock,’ said I, ‘would you rent part of your house?’

“She looked up reflectively, took off her spectacles with her left hand, and tapped her knees slowly with them, as she always did when puzzling over a scanty pattern.

“’I don’t know, Dora, but I might; I’ve thought of it; it’s awful lonely for me as ’tis.  But it’s such a risk taking in strangers; is it any friends of yours you’re thinking of?’

“‘Nat and me,’ said I, concisely.  Miss Penstock’s spectacles dropped from her fingers, and she uttered an ejaculation I never heard from her lips on any other occasion.  ‘Good Heavens!’

“‘Yes,’ said I, beginning to cry, ’Nat and me!  I’ve got to take care of Nat, and if you would only let us live with you I think I could manage beautifully.’  Then I told her the whole story of Mr. Maynard’s proposal.  While we were talking Aunt Abby came in.  The problem was no new one to her.  Papa and she had talked it over many a time in the course of the past sad year.  It seemed that he had had to the last a strong hope that Mr. Maynard would provide for us both.  Poor papa! as he drew near the next world, all the conventionalities and obligations of this seemed so small to him, he did not shrink from the thought of dependence upon others as he would have done in health.

“‘But I always told him,’ said Aunt Abby, ’that Mr. Maynard wasn’t going to do anything for Nat beyond what money’d do.  He’d give him a thousand a year, or two, if need be, but he’d never set eyes on him if he could help it.’

“‘Aunt Abby,’ exclaimed I, ’please don’t say another word about Mr. Maynard’s helping Nat.  I’d die before Nat should touch a cent of his money.’

“‘There is no use talking that way,’ said Aunt Abby, whose tenderest mercies were often cruelly worded.  ’Mr. Maynard’s a good, generous man, and I’m sure he’s been the saving of us all.  But that’s no reason he should set up to take you away from Nat now; and I know well enough Nat can’t live without you; but I don’t see how it’s to be managed.  And Aunt Abby sighed.  Then I told her my plans; they grew clearer and clearer to me as I unfolded them; the two gentle-faced spinster women looked at me with surprise.  Miss Penstock wiped her eyes over and over.