“I’ll settle Bethy’s troubles, and then I’ll tell you mine.  They are not very wearing, so they’ll keep.” and Jo stitched away, with a wise nod which set her mother’s heart at rest about her for the present at least.

While apparently absorbed in her own affairs, Jo watched Beth, and after many conflicting conjectures, finally settled upon one which seemed to explain the change in her.  A slight incident gave Jo the clue to the mystery, she thought, and lively fancy, loving heart did the rest.  She was affecting to write busily one Saturday afternoon, when she and Beth were alone together.  Yet as she scribbled, she kept her eye on her sister, who seemed unusually quiet.  Sitting at the window, Beth’s work often dropped into her lap, and she leaned her head upon her hand, in a dejected attitude, while her eyes rested on the dull, autumnal landscape.  Suddenly some one passed below, whistling like an operatic blackbird, and a voice called out, “All serene!  Coming in tonight.”

Beth started, leaned forward, smiled and nodded, watched the passer-by till his quick tramp died away, then said softly as if to herself, “How strong and well and happy that dear boy looks.”

“Hum!” said Jo, still intent upon her sister’s face, for the bright color faded as quickly as it came, the smile vanished, and presently a tear lay shining on the window ledge.  Beth whisked it off, and in her half-averted face read a tender sorrow that made her own eyes fill.  Fearing to betray herself, she slipped away, murmuring something about needing more paper.

“Mercy on me, Beth loves Laurie!” she said, sitting down in her own room, pale with the shock of the discovery which she believed she had just made.  “I never dreamed of such a thing.  What will Mother say?  I wonder if her . . .” there Jo stopped and turned scarlet with a sudden thought.  “If he shouldn’t love back again, how dreadful it would be.  He must.  I’ll make him!” and she shook her head threateningly at the picture of the mischievous-looking boy laughing at her from the wall.  “Oh dear, we are growing up with a vengeance.  Here’s Meg married and a mamma, Amy flourishing away at Paris, and Beth in love.  I’m the only one that has sense enough to keep out of mischief.”  Jo thought intently for a minute with her eyes fixed on the picture, then she smoothed out her wrinkled forehead and said, with a decided nod at the face opposite, “No thank you, sir, you’re very charming, but you’ve no more stability than a weathercock.  So you needn’t write touching notes and smile in that insinuating way, for it won’t do a bit of good, and I won’t have it.”