APDL Eductation Resources/APDL Eductation Resources.iso/text/books/little_wmn/CHAP40_36

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                       CHAPTER FORTY

     When the first bitterness was over, the family accepted
the inevitable, and tried to bear it cheerfully, helping one
another by the increased affection which comes to bind house-
holds tenderly together in times of trouble.  They put away
their grief, and each did his or her part toward making that
last year a happy one.

     The pleasantest room in the house was set apart for Beth,
and in it was gathered everything that she most loved, flowers,
pictures, her piano, the little worktable, and the beloved
pussies.  Father's best books found their way there, Mother's
easy chair, Jo's desk, Amy's finest sketches, and every day
Meg brought her babies on a loving pilgrimage, to make sunshine
for Aunty Beth.  John quietly set apart a little sum, that he
might enjoy the pleasure of keeping the invalid supplied with
the fruit she loved and longed for.  Old Hannah never wearied
of concocting dainty dishes to tempt a capricious appetite,
dropping tears as she worked, and from across the sea came
little gifts and cheerful letters, seeming to bring breaths
of warmth and fragrance from lands that know no winter.

     Here, cherished like a household saint in its shrine, sat
Beth, tranquil and busy as ever, for nothing could change the
sweet, unselfish nature, and even while preparing to leave
life, she tried to make it happier for those who should remain
behind.  The feeble fingers were never idle, and one of her
pleasures  was to make little things for the school children
daily passing to and fro, to drop a pair of mittens from her
window for a pair of purple hands, a needlebook for some small
mother of many dolls, penwipers for young penmen toiling through
forests of pothooks, scrapbooks for picture-loving eyes, and
all manner of pleasant devices, till the reluctant climbers of
the ladder of learning found their way strewn with flowers, as
it were, and came to regard the gentle giver as a sort of fairy
godmother, who sat above there, and showered down gifts miracu-
lously suited to their tastes and needs.  If Beth had wanted any
reward, she found it in the bright little faces always turned up
to her window, with nods and smiles, and the droll little letters
which came to her, full of blots and gratitude.

     The first few months were very happy ones, and Beth often
used to look round, and say "How beautiful this is!" as they
all sat together in her sunny room, the babies kicking and crow-
ing on the floor, mother and sisters working near, and father
reading, in his pleasant voice,from the wise old books which
seemed rich in good and comfortable words, as applicable now as
when written centuries ago, a little chapel, where a paternal
priest taught his flock the hard lessons all must learn, trying
to show them that hope can comfort love, and faith make resig-
nation possible.  Simple sermons, that went straight to the souls
of those who listened, for the father's heart was in the minister's
religion, and the frequent falter in the voice gave a double
eloquence to the words he spoke or read.

     It was well for all that this peaceful time was given them
as preparation for the sad hours to come, for by-and-by, Beth
said the needle was `so heavy', and put it down forever.  Talking
wearied her, faces troubled her, pain claimed her for its own,
and her tranquil spirit was sorrowfully perturbed by the ills
that vexed her feeble flesh.  Ah me!  Such heavy days, such long,
long nights, such aching hearts and imploring prayers, when those
who loved her best were forced to see the thin hands stretched out
to them beseechingly, to hear the bitter cry, "Help me, help me!"
and to feel that there was no help.  A sad eclipse of the serene
soul, a sharp struggle of the young life with death, but both were
mercifully brief, and then the natural rebellion over, the old peace
returned more beautiful than ever.  With the wreck of her frail body,
Beth's soul grew strong, and though she said little, those about her
felt that she was ready, saw that the first pilgrim called was like-
wise the fittest, and waited with her on the shore, trying to see
the Shining Ones coming to receive her when she crossed the river.

     Jo never left her for an hour since Beth had said "I feel
stronger when you are here."  She slept on a couch in the room,
waking often to renew the fire, to feed, lift, or wait upon the
patient creature who seldom asked for anything, and `tried not to
be a trouble'.  All day she haunted the room, jealous of any other
nurse, and prouder of being chosen then than of any honor her life
ever brought her.  Precious and helpful hours to Jo, for now her
heart received the teaching that it needed.  Lessons in patience
were so sweetly taught her that she could not fail to learn them,
charity for all, the lovely spirit that can forgive and truly
forget unkindness, the loyalty to duty that makes the hardest
easy, and the sincere faith that fears nothing, but trusts un-
doubtingly.

     Often when she woke Jo found Beth reading in her well-worn
little book, heard her singing softly, to beguile the sleepless
night, or saw her lean her face upon her hands, while slow tears
dropped through the transparent fingers, and Jo would lie watch-
ing her with thoughts too deep for tears, feeling that Beth, in
her simple, unselfish way, was trying to wean herself from the
dear old life, and fit herself for the life to come, by sacred
words of comfort, quiet prayers, and the music she loved so well.

     Seeing this did more for Jo than the wisest sermons, the
saintliest hymns, the most fervent prayers that any voice could
utter.  For with eyes made clear by many tears, and a heart
softened by the tenderest sorrow, she recognized the beauty of
her sister's life--uneventful, unambitious, yet full of the
genuine virtues which `smell sweet, and blossom in the dust',
the self-forgetfulness that makes the humblest on earth re-
membered soonest in heaven, the true success which is possible
to all.

     One night when Beth looked among the books upon her table,
to find something to make her forget the mortal weariness that
was almost as hard to bear as pain, as she turned the leaves of
her old favorite, Pilgrims's Progress, she found a little paper,
scribbled over in Jo's hand.  The name caught her eye and the
blurred look of the lines made her sure that tears had fallen
on it.

     "Poor Jo!  She's fast asleep, so I won't wake her to ask
leave.  She shows me all her things, and I don't think she'll
mind if I look at this", thought Beth, with a glance at her
sister, who lay on the rug, with the tongs beside her, ready
to wake up the minute the log fell apart.

                        MY BETH

              Sitting patient in the shadow
              Till the blessed light shall come,
              A serene and saintly presence
              Sanctifies our troubled home.
              Earthly joys and hopes and sorrows
              Break like ripples on the strand
              Of the deep and solemn river
              Where her willing feet now stand.

              O my sister, passing from me,
              Out of human care and strife,
              Leave me, as a gift, those virtues
              Which have beautified your life.
              Dear, bequeath me that great patience
              Which has power to sustain
              A cheerful, uncomplaining spirit
              In its prison-house of pain.

              Give me, for I need it sorely,
              Of that courage, wise and sweet,
              Which has made the path of duty
              Green beneath your willing feet.
              Give me that unselfish nature,
              That with charity devine
              Can pardon wrong for love's dear sake--
              Meek heart, forgive me mine!

              Thus our parting daily loseth
              Something of its bitter pain,
              And while learning this hard lesson,
              My great loss becomes my gain.
              For the touch of grief will render
              My wild nature more serene,
              Give to life new aspirations,
              A new trust in the unseen.

              Henceforth, safe across the river,
              I shall see forever more
              A beloved, household spirit
              Waiting for me on the shore.
              Hope and faith, born of my sorrow,
              Guardian angels shall become,
              And the sister gone before me
              By their hands shall lead me home.

     Blurred and blotted, faulty and feeble as the lines were, they
brought a look of inexpressible comfort to Beth's face, for her one
regret had been that she had done so little, and this seemed to assure
her that her life had not been useless, that her death would not bring
the despair she feared.  As she sat with the paper folded between her
hands, the charred log fell asunder.  Jo started up, revived the blaze,
and crept to the bedside, hoping Beth slept.

     "Not asleep, but so happy, dear.  See, I found this and read it.
I knew you wouldn't care.  Have I been all that to you, Jo?" she
asked, with wistful, humble earnestness.

     "OH, Beth, so much, so much!"  And Jo's head went down upon the
pillow beside her sister's.

     "Then I don't feel as if I'd wasted my life.  I'm not so good
as you make me, but I have tried to do right.  And now, when it's
too late to begin even to do better, it's such a comfort to know
that someone loves me so much, and feels as if I'd helped them."

     "More than any one in the world, Beth.  I used to think I
couldn't let you go, but I'm learning to feel that I don't lose
you, that you'll be more to me than ever, and death can't part
us, though it seems to."

     "I know it cannot, and I don't fear it any longer, for I'm
sure I shall be your Beth still, to love and help you more than
ever.  You must take my place, Jo, and be everything to Father
and Mother when I'm gone.  They will turn to you, don't fail
them, and if it's hard to work alone, remember that I don't
forget you, and that you'll be happier in doing that than writing
splendid books or seeing all the world, for love is the only thing
that we can carry with us when we go, and it makes the go easy."

     "I'll try, Beth."  And then and there Jo renounced her old
ambition, pledged herself to a new and better one, acknowledging
the poverty of other desires, and feeling the blessed solace of
a belief in the immortality of love.

     So the spring days came and went , the sky grew clearer, the
earth greener, the flowers were up fairly early, and the birds
came back in time to say goodbye to Beth, who, like a tired but
trustful child, clung to the hands that had led her all her life,
as Father and Mother guided her tenderly through the Valley of
the Shadow, and gave her up to God.

     Seldom except in books do the dying utter memorable words,
see visions, or depart with beatified countenances, and those
who have sped many parting souls know that to most the end
comes as naturally and simply as sleep.  As Beth had hoped, the
`tide went out easily', and in the dark hour before dawn, on
the bosom where she had drawn her first breath, she quietly
drew her last, with no farewell but one loving look, one little
sigh.

     With tears and prayers and tender hands, Mother and sisters
made her ready for the long sleep that pain would never mar again,
seeing with grateful eyes the beautiful serenity that soon replaced
the pathetic patience that had wrung their hearts so long, and
feeling with reverent joy that to their darling death was a
benignant angel, not a phantom full of dread.

     When morning came, for the first time in many months the
fire was out, Jo's place was empty, and the room was very still.
But a bird sang blithely on a budding bough, close by, the snow-
drops blossomed freshly at the window, and the spring sunshine
streamed in like a benediction over the placid face upon the
pillow, a face so full of painless peace that those who loved
it best smiled through their tears, and thanked God that Beth
was well at last.


                      CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

     Amy's lecture did Laurie good, though, of course, he did
not own it till long afterward.  Men seldom do, for when women
are the advisers, the lords of creation don't take the advice
till they have persuaded themselves that it is just what they
intended to do.  Then they act upon it, and, if it succeeds,
they give the weaker vessel half the credit of it.  If it
fails, they generously give her the whole.  Laurie went back
to his grandfather, and was so dutifully devoted for several
weeks that the old gentleman declared the climate of Nice had
improved him wonderfully, and he had better try it again.
There was nothing the young gentleman would have liked better,
but elephants could not have dragged him back after the scold-
ing he had received.  Pride forbid, and whenever the longing
grew very strong, he fortified his resolution by repeating
the words that had made the deepest impression, "I despise
you."  "Go and do something splendid that will make her love
you."

     Laurie turned the matter over in his mind so often that he
soon brought himself to confess that he had been selfish and
lazy, but then when a man has a great sorrow, he should be in-
dulged in all sorts of vagaries till he has lived it down.  He
felt that his blighted affections were quite dead now, and
though he should never cease to be a faithful mourner, there
was no occasion to wear his weeds ostentatiously. Jo wouldn't
love him, but he might make her respect and admire him by doing
something which should prove that a girl's no had not spoiled
his life.  He had always meant to do something, and Amy's
advice was quite unnecessary.  He had only been waiting till
the aforesaid blighted affections were decently interred. That
being done, he felt that he was ready to `hide his stricken
heart, and still toil on'.

     As Goethe, when he had a joy or a grief, put it into a song,
so Laurie resolved to embalm his love sorrow in music, and to
compose a Requiem which should harrow up Jo's soul and melt the
heart of every hearer.  Therefore the next time the old gentle-
man found him getting restless and moody and ordered him off,
he went to Vienna, where he had musical friends, and fell to
work with the firm determination to distinguish himself.  But
whether the sorrow was too vast to be embodied in music, or
music too ethereal to uplift a mortal woe, he soon discovered
that the Requiem was beyond him just at present.  It was evi-
dent that his mind was not in working order yet, and his ideas
needed clarifying, for often in the middle of a plaintive strain,
he would find himself humming a dancing tune that vividly re-
called the Christmas ball at Nice, especially the stout French-
man, and put an effectual stop to tragic composition for the
time being.

     Then he tried an opera, for nothing seemed impossible in
the beginning, but here again unforeseen difficulties beset
him.  He wanted Jo for his heroine, and called upon his memory
to supply him with tender recollections and romantic visions
of his love.  But memory turned traitor, and as if possessed
by the perverse spirit of the girl, would only recall Jo's
oddities, faults, and freaks, would only show her in the most
unsentimental aspects--beating mats with her head tied up in
a bandana, barricading herself with the sofa pillow, or throw-
ing cold water over his passion a la Gummidge--and an irresis-
table laugh spoiled the pensive picture he was endeavoring to
paint.  Jo wouldn't be put into the opera at any price, and he
had to give her up with a "Bless that girl, what a torment she is!"
and a clutch at his hair, as became a distracted composer.

     When he looked about him for another and a less intractable
damsel to immortalize in melody, memory produced one with the
most obliging readiness.  This phantom wore many faces, but it
always had golden hair, was enveloped in a diaphanous cloud, and
floated airily before his mind's eye in a pleasing chaos of roses,
peacocks, white ponies, and blue ribbons.  He did not give the
complacent wraith any name, but he took her for his heroine and
grew quite fond of her, as well he might, for he gifted her with
every gift and grace under the sun, and escorted her, unscathed,
through trials which would have annihilated any mortal woman.

     Thanks to this inspiration, he got on swimmingly for a time,
but gradually the work lost its charm, and he forgot to compose,
while he sat musing, pen in hand, or roamed about the gay city
to get some new ideas and refresh his mind, which seemed to be
in a somewhat unsettled state that winter.  He did not do much,
but he thought a great deal and was conscious of a change of
some sort going on in spite of himself.  "It's genius simmering,
perhaps.  I'll let it simmer, and see what comes of it," he said,
with a secret suspicion all the while that it wasn't genius, but
something far more common.  Whatever it was, it simmered to
some purpose, for he grew more and more discontented with his
desultory life, began to long for some real and earnest work
to go at, soul and body, and finally came to the wise conclu-
sion that everyone who loved music was not a composer.  Return-
ing from one of Mozart's grand operas, splendidly performed at
the Royal Theatre, he looked over his own, played a few of the
best parts, sat staring at the busts of Mendelssohn, Beethoven,
and bach, who stared benignly back again.  Then suddenly he
tore up his music sheets, one by one, and as the last fluttered
out of his hand, he said soberly to himself . . .

     "She is right!  Talent isn't genius, and you can't make it
so.  That music has taken the vanity out of my as Rome took it
out of her, and I won't be a humbug any longer.  Now what shall
I do?"

     That seemed a hard question to answer, and Laurie began to
wish he had to work for his daily bread.  Now if ever, occurred
an eligible opportunity for `going to the devil', as he once
forcibly expressed it, for he had plenty of money and nothing
to do, and Satan is proverbially fond of providing employment
for full and idle hands.  The poor fellow had temptations
enough from without and from within, but he withstood them
pretty well, for much as he valued liberty, he valued good
faith and confidence more, so his promise to his grandfather,
and his desire to be able to look honestly into the eyes of
the women who loved him, and say "All's well," kept him safe
and steady.

     Very likely some Mrs. Grundy will observe, "I don't be-
lieve it, boys will be boys, young men must sow their wild
oats, and women must not expect miracles."  I dare say you
don't, Mrs. Grundy, but it's true nevertheless.  Women work
a good many miracles, and I have a persuasion that they may
perform even that of raising the standard of manhood by
refusing to echo such sayings.  Let the boys be boys, the
longer the better, and let the young men sow their wild oats
if they must.  But mothers, sisters, and friends may help to
make the crop a small one, and keep many tares from spoiling
the harvest, by believing, and showing that they believe, in
the possibility of loyalty to the virtues which make men man-
liest in good women's eyes.  If it is a feminine delusion,
leave us to enjoy it while we may, for without it half the
beauty and the romance of life is lost, and sorrowful fore-
bodings would embitter all our hopes of the brave, tender-
hearted little lads, who still love their mothers better than
themselves and are not ashamed to own it.

     Laurie thought that the task of forgetting his love for Jo
would absorb all his powers for years, but to his great surprise
he discovered it grew easier every day.  He refused to believe
it at first, got angry with himself, and couldn't understand it,
but these hearts of ours are curious and contrary things, and
time and nature work their will in spite of us.  Laurie's heart
wouldn't ache.  The wound persisted in healing with a rapidity
that astonished him, and instead of trying to forget, he found
himself trying to remember.  He had not foreseen this turn of
affairs, and was not prepared for it.  He was disgusted with
himself, surprised at his own fickleness, and full of a
queer mixture of disappointment and relief that he could re-
cover from such a tremendous blow so soon.  He carefully
stirred up the embers of his lost love, but they refused to
burst into a blaze.  There was only a comfortable glow that
warmed and did him good without putting him into a fever,
and he was reluctantly obliged to confess that the boyish
passion was slowly subbsiding into a more tranquil sentiment,
very tender, a little sad and resentful still, but that was
sure to pass away in time, leaving a brotherly affection
which would last unbroken to the end.

     As the word `brotherly' passed through his mind in one
of his reveries, he smiled, and glanced up at the picture of
Mozart that was before him . . .

     "Well, he was a great man, and when he couldn't have
one sister he took the other, and was happy."

     Laurie did not utter the words, but he thought them, and
the next instant kissed the little old ring, saying to himself,
"No, I won't!  I haven't forgotten, I never can.  I'll try again,
and if that fails, why then . . .

     Leaving his sentence unfinished, he seized pen and paper
and wrote to Jo, telling her that he could not settle to any-
thing while there was the least hope of her changing her mind.
Couldn't she, wouldn't she, and let him come home and be happy?
While waiting for an answer he did nothing, but he did it
energetically, for he was in a fever of impatience.  It came
at last, and settled his mind effectually on one point, for Jo
decidedly couldn't and wouldn't.  She was wrapped up in Beth,
and never wished to hear the word love again.  Then she begged
him to be happy with somebody else, but always keep a little
corner of his ghart for his loving sister Jo.  In a postscript
she desired him not to tell Amy that Beth was worse, she was
coming home in the spring and there was no need of saddening
the remainder of her stay.  That would be time enough, please
God, but Laurie must write to her often, and not let her feel
lonely, homesick or anxious.

     "So I will, at once.  Poor little girl, it will be a sad
going home for her, I'm afraid."  And Laurie opened his desk,
as if writing to Amy had been the proper conclusion of the
sentence left unfinished some weeks before.

     But he did not write the letter that day, for as he rum-
maged out his best paper, he came across something which
changed his purpose.  Tumbling about in one part of the desk
among bills, passports, and business documents of various kinds
were several of Jo's letters, and in another compartment were
three notes from Amy, carefully tied up with one of her blue
ribbons and sweetly suggestive of the little dead roses put
away inside.  with a half-repentant, half-amused expression,
Laurie gathered up all Jo's letters, smoothed, folded,and put
them neatly into a small drawer of the desk, stood a minute
turning the ring thoughtfully on his finger, then slowly drew
it off, laid it with the letters, locked the drawer, and went
out to hear High Mass at Saint Stefan's, feeling as if there
had been a funeral, and though not overwhelmed with affliction,
this seemed a more proper way to spend the rest of the day than
in writing letters to charming young ladies.

     The letter went very soon, however, and was promptly ans-
wered, for Amy was homesick, and confessed it in the most
delightfully confiding manner.  The correspondence flourished
famously, and letters flew to and fro with unfailing regularity
all through the early spring.  Laurie sold his busts, made
allumettes of his opera, and went back to Paris, hoping some-
body would arrive before long.  He wanted desperately to go
to Nice, but would not till he was asked, and Amy would not
ask him, for just then she was having little experiences of
her own, which made her rather wish to avoid the quizzical
eyes of `out boy'.

     Fred Vaughn had returned, and put the question to which
she had once decided to answer, "Yes, thank you," but now she
said, "No, thank you," kindly but steadily, for when the time
came, her courage failed her, and she found that something
more than money and position was needed to satisfy the new
longing that filled her heart so full of tender hopes and
fears.  The words, "Fred is a good fellow, but not at all
the man I fancied you would ever like," and Laurie's face
when he uttered them, kept returning to her as pertinaciously
as her own did when she said in look, if not in words, "I
shall marry for money."  It troubled her to remember that
now, she wished she could take it back, it sounded so un-
womanly.  She didn't want Laurie to think her a heartless,
worldly creature.  She didn't care to be a queen of society
now half so much as she did to be a lovable woman.  She was
so glad he didn't hate her for the dreadful things she said,
but took them so beautifully and was kinder than ever.  His
letters were such a comfort, for the home letters were very
irregular and not half so satisfactory as his when they did
come.  It was not only a pleasure, but a duty to answer them,
for the poor fellow was forlorn, and needed petting, since Jo
persisted in being stonyhearted.  She ought to have made an
effort and tried to love him.  It couldn't be very hard,
many people would be proud and glad to have such a dear boy
care for them.  But Jo never would act like other girls, so
there was nothing to do but be very kind and treat him like
a brother.

     If all brothers were treated as well as Laurie was at
this period, they would be a much happier race of beings than
they are.  Amy never lectured now.  She asked his opinion on
all subjects, she was interested in everything he did, made
charming little presents for him, and sent him two letters
a week, full of lively gossip, sisterly confidences, and cap-
tivating sketches of the lovely scenes about her.  As few
brothers are complimented by having their letters carried
about in their sister's pockets, read and reread diligently,
cried over when short, kissed when long, and treasured care-
fully, we will not hint that Amy did any of these fond and
foolish things.  But she certainly did grow a little pale
and pensive that spring, lost much of her relish for society,
and went out sketching alone a good deal.  She never had much
to show when she came home, but was studying nature, I dare
say, while she sat for hours, with her hands folded, on the
terrace at Valrosa, or absently sketched any fancy that
occurred to her, a stalwart knight carved on a tomb, a young
man asleep in the grass, with his hat over his eyes, or a curly-
haired girl in gorgeous array, promenading down a ballroom on
the arm of a tall gentleman, both faces being left a blur
according to the last fashion in art, which was safe but not
altogether satisfactory.

     Her aunt thought that she regretted her answer to Fred,
and finding denials useless and explanations impossible, Amy
left her to think what she liked, taking care that Laurie
should know that Fred had gone to Egypt.  That was all, but
he understood it, and looked relieved, as he said to himself,
with a venerable air . ..

     "I was sure she would think better of it.  Poor old fellow!
I've been through it all, and I can sympathize."

     With that he heaved a great sigh, and then, as if he had
discharged his duty to the past, put his feet up on the sofa
and enjoyed Amy's letter luxuriously.

     While these changes were going on abroad, trouble had
come at home.  But the letter telling that Beth was failing
never reached Amy, and when the next found her at Vevay, for
the heat had driven them from Nice in May, and they had tra-
velled slowly to Switzerland, by way of Genoa and the Italian
lakes.  She bore it very well, and quietly submitted to the
family decree that she should not shorten her visit, for
since it was too late to say goodbye to Beth, she had better
stay, and let absence soften her sorrow.  But her heart was
very heavy, she longed to be at home, and every day looked
wistfully across the lake, waiting for Laurie to come and
comfort her.

     He did come very soon, for the same mail brought letters
to them both, but he was in Germany, and it took some days to
reach him.  The moment he read it, he packed his knapsack,
bade adieu to his fellow pedestrians, and was off to keep his
promise, with a heart full of joy and sorrow, hope and sus-
pense.

     He knew Vevay well, and as soon as the boat touched the
little quay, he hurried along the shore to La Tour, where the
Carrols were living en pension.  The garcon was in despair
that the whole family had gone to take a promenade on the
lake, but no, the blonde mademoiselle might be in the chateau
garden.  If monsier would give himself the pain of sitting
down, a flash of time should present her.  But monsieur could
not wait even a `flash of time', and in the middle of the
speech departed to find mademoiselle himself.

     A pleasant old garden on the borders of the lovely lake,
with chestnuts rustling overhead, ivy climbing everywhere, and
the black shadow of the tower falling far across the sunny
water.  At one corner of the wide, low wall was a seat,and here
Amy often came to read or work, or console herself with the
beauty all about her.  She was sitting here that day, leaning
her head on her hand, with a homesick heart and heavy eyes,
thinking of Beth and wondering why Laurie did not come.  She
did not hear him cross the courtyard beyond, nor see him pause
in the archway that led from the subterranean path into the
garden.  He stood a minute looking at her with new eyes, seeing
what no one had ever seen before, the tender side of Amy's char-
acter.  Everything about her mutely suggested love and sorrow,
the blotted letters in her lap, the black ribbon that tied up
her hair, the womanly pain and patience in her face, even the
little ebony cross at her throat seemed pathetic to Laurie,
for he had given it to her, and she wore it as her only orna-
ment.  If he had any doubts about the reception she would give
him, they were set at rest the minute she looked up and saw
him, for dropping everything, she ran to him, exclaiming in a
tone of unmistakable love and longing . . .

     "Oh, Laurie, Laurie, I knew you'd come to me!"

     I think everything was said and settled then, for as they
stood together quite silent for a moment, with the dark head
bent down protectingly over the light one, Amy felt that no
one could comfort and sustain her so well as Laurie, and
Laurie decided that Amy was the only woman in the world who
could fill Jo's place and make him happy.  He did not tell her
so, but she was not disappointed, for both felt the truth,
were satisfied, and gladly left the rest to silence.

     In a minute Amy went back to her place, and while she
dried her tears, Laurie gathered up the scattered papers,
finding in the sight of sundry well-worn letters and suggestive
sketches good omens for the future.  As he sat down beside her,
amy felt shy again, and turned rosy red at the recollection of
her impulsive greeting.

     "I couldn't help it, I felt so lonely and sad, and was so
very glad to see you.  It was such a surprise to look up and find
you, just as I was beginning to fear you wouldn't come," she said,
trying in vain to speak quite naturally.

     "I came the minute I heard.  I wish I could say something
to comfort you for the loss of dear little Beth, but I can only
feel, and . . ."  He could not get any further, for her too
turned bashful all of a sudden, and did not quite know what to
say.  He longed to lay Amy's head down on his shoulder, and tell
her to have a good cry, but he did not dare, so took her hand
instead, and gave it a sympathetic squeeze that was better than
words.

     "You needn't say anything, this comforts me," she said
softly.  "Beth is well and happy, and I mustn't wish her back,
but I dread the going home, much as I long to see them all.
We won't talk about it now, for it makes me cry, and I want
to enjoy you while you stay.  You needn't go right back, need
you?"

     "Not if you want me, dear."

     "I do, so much.  Aunt and Flo are very kind, but you
seem like one of the family, and it would be so comfortable to
have you for a little while."

     Amy spoke and looked so like a homesick child whose heart
was full that Laurie forgot his bashfulness all at once, and
gave her just what she wanted--the petting she was used to and
the cheerful conversation she needed.

     "Poor little soul, you look as if you'd grieved yourself
half sick!  I'm going to take care of you, so don't cry any
more, but come and walk about with me, the wind is too chilly
for you to sit still,"  he said, in the half-caressing, half-
commanding way that Amy liked, as he tied on her hat, drew
her arm through his, and began to pace up and down the
sunny walk under the new-leaved chestnuts.  He felt more at
ease upon his legs, and Amy found it pleasant to have a strong
arm to lean upon, a familiar face to smile at her, and a kind
voice to talk delightfully for her alone.

     The quaint old garden had sheltered many pairs of lovers,
and seemed expressly made for them, so sunny and secluded was
it, with nothing but the tower to overlook them, and the wide
lake to carry away the echo of their words, as it rippled by
below.  For an hour this new pair walked and talked, or rested
on the wall, enjoying the sweet influences which gave such a
charm to time and place, and when an unromantic dinner bell
warned them away, Amy felt as if she left her burden of lon-
liness and sorrow behind her in the chateau garden.

     The moment Mrs. Carrol saw the girl's altered face, she
was illuminated with a new idea, and exclaimed to herself,
"Now I understand it all--the child has been pining for young
Laurence.  Bless my heart, I never thought of such a thing!"

     With praiseworthy discretion, the good lady said nothing,
and betrayed no sign of enlightenment, but cordially urged
Laurie to stay and begged Amy to enjoy his society, for it
would do her more good than so much solitude.  Amy was a
model of docility, and as her aunt was a good deal occupied
with Flo, she was left to entertain her friend, and did it
with more than her usual success.

     At Nice, Laurie had lounged and Amy had scolded.  At
Vevay, Laurie was never idle, but always walking, riding,
boating, or studying in the most energetic manner, while
Amy admired everything he did and followed his example as
far and as fast as she could.  He said the change was owing
to the climate, and she did not contradict him, being glad
of a like excuse for her own recovered health and spirits.

     The invigorating air did them both good, and much ex-
ercise worked wholesome changes in minds as well as bodies.
They seemed to get clearer views of life and duty up there
among the everlasting hills.  The fresh winds blew away
desponding doubts, delusive fancies, and moody mists. The
warm spring sunshine brought out all sorts of aspiring ideas,
tender hopes, and happy thoughts.  The lake seemed to wash
away the troubles of the past, and the grand old mountains
to look benignly down upon them saying, "Little children,
love one another."

     In spite of the new sorrow, it was a very happy time, so
happy that Laurie could not bear to disturb it by a word.  It
took him a little while to recover from his surprise at the
cure of his first, and as he had firmly believed, his last
and only love.  He consoled himself for the seeming disloyalty
by the thought that Jo's sister was almost the same as Jo's
self, and the conviction that it would have been impossible
to love any other woman but Amy so soon and so well.  His first
wooing had been of the tempestuous order, and he looked back
upon ;it as if through a long vista of years with a feeling of
compassion blended with regret.  He was not ashamed of it,
but put it away as one of the bitter-sweet experiences of his
life, for which he could be grateful when the pain was over.
His second wooing, he resolved, should be as calm and simple
as possible.  There was no need  of having a scene, hardly
any need of telling Amy that he loved her, she knew it with-
out words and had given him his answer long ago.  It all came
about so naturally that no one could complain, and he knew that
everybody would be pleased, even Jo.  But when our first little
passion has been crushed, we are apt to be wary and slow in mak-
ing a second trial, so Laurie let the days pass, enjoying every
hour, and leaving to chance the utterance of the word that would
put an end to the first and sweetest part of his new romance.

     He had rather imagined that the denoument would take place
in the chateau garden by moonlight, and in the most graceful and
decorus manner, but it turned out exactly the reverse, for the
matter was settled on the lake at noonday in a few blunt words.
They had been floating about all the morning, from gloomy St. Gin-
golf to sunny Montreux, with the Alps of Savoy on one side, Mont
St. Bernard and the Dent du Midi on the other, pretty Vevay in
the valley, and Lausanne upon the hill beyond, a cloudless blue
sky overhead, and the bluer lake below, dotted with the pictur-
esque boats that look like white-winged gulls.

     They had been talking of Bonnivard, as they glided past
Chillon, and of Rousseau, as they looked up at Clarens, where he
wrote his Heloise.  Neither had read it, but they knew it was a
love story, and each privately wondered if it was half as inte-
resting as their own.  Amy had been dabbling her hand in the water
during the little pause that fell between them, and when she looked
up, Laurie was leaning on his oars with an expression in his eyes
that made her say hastily, merely for the sake of saying something . .

     "You must be tired.  Rest a little, and let me row.  It will
do me good, for since you came I have been altogether lazy and
luxurious."

     "I'm not tired, but you may take an oar, if you like.  There's
room enough, though I have to sit nearly in the middle, else the
boat won't trim," returned Laurie, as if he rather liked the arrang-
ment.

     Feeling that she had not mended matters much, Amy took the
offered third of a seat, shook her hair over her face, and accepted
an oar.  She rowed as well as she did many other things, and though
she used both hands, and Laurie but one, the oars kept time, and
the boat went smoothly through the water.

     "How well we pull together, don't we?" said Amy, who objected
to silence just then.

     "So well that I wish we might always pull in the same boat.
Will you,Amy?" very tenderly.

     "Yes, Laurie," very low.

     Then they both stopped rowing, and unconsciously added a
pretty little tableau of human love and happiness to the dissolving
views reflected in the lake.


                    CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

     It was easy to promise self-abnegation when self was
wrapped up in another, and heart and soul were purified by a
sweet example.  But when the helpful voice was silent, the
daily lesson over, the beloved presence gone, and nothing re-
mained but lonliness and grief, then Jo found her promise very
hard to keep.  How could she `comfort Father and Mother' when
her own heart ached with a ceaseless longing for her sister,
how could she `make the house cheerful' when all its light and
warmth and beauty seemed to have deserted it when Beth left the
old home for the new, and where in all the world could she `find
some useful, happy work to do', that would take the place of the
loving service which had been its own reward?  She tried in a
blind, hopeless way to do her duty, secretly rebelling against
it all the while, for it seemed unjust that her few joys should
be lessened, her burdens made heavier, and life get harder and
harder as she toiled along.  Some people seemed to get all sun-
shine, and some all shadow.  It was not fair, for she tried more
than Amy to be good, but never got any reward, only disappoint-
ment, trouble and hard work.

     Poor Jo, these were dark days to her, for something like
despair came over her when she thought of spending all her life
in that quiet house, devoted to humdrum cares, a few small plea-
sures, and the duty that never seemed to grow any easier.  "I
can't do it.  I wasn't meant for a life like this, and I know I
shall break away and do something desperate if somebody doesn't
come and help me," she said to herself, when her first efforts
failed and she fell into the moody, miserable state of mind which
often comes when strong wills have to yield to the inevitable.

     But someone did come and help her, though Jo did not recognize
her good angels at once because they wore familiar shapes and used
the simple spells best fitted to poor humanity.  Often she started
up at night, thinking Beth called her, and when the sight of the
little empty bed made her cry with the bitter cry of unsubmissive
sorrow, "Oh, Beth, come back!  Come back!" she did not stretch out
her yearning arms in vain.  For, as quick to hear her sobbing as
she had been to hear her sister's faintest whisper, her mother came
to comfort her, not with words only, but the patient tenderness
that soothes by a touch, tears that were mute reminders of a greater
grief than Jo's, and broken whispers, more eloquent than prayers,
because hopeful resignation went hand-in-hand with natural sorrow.
Sacred moments, when heart talked to heart in the silence of the
night, turning affliction to a blessing, which chastened grief and
strengthned love.  Feeling this, Jo's burden seemed easier to bear,
duty grew sweeter, and life looked more endurable, seen from the
safe shelter of her mother's arms.

     When aching heart was a little comforted, troubled mind like-
wise found help, for one day she went to the study, and leaning
over the good gray head lifted to welcome her with a tranquil smile,
she said very humbly, "Father, talk to me as you did to Beth.  I
need it more than she did, for I'm all wrong."

     "My dear, nothing can comfort me like this," he answered, with
a falter in his voice, and both arms round her, as if he too, needed
help, and did not fear to ask for it.

     Then, sitting in Beth's little chair close beside him, Jo told
her troubles, the resentful sorrow for her loss, the fruitless
efforts that discouraged her, the want of faith that made life look
so dark, and all the sad bewilderment which we call despair.  She
gave him entire confidence, he gave her the help she needed, and
both found consolation in the act.  For the time had come when they
could talk together not only as father and daughter, but as man and
woman, able and glad to serve each other with mutual sympathy as well
as mutual love.  Happy, thoughtful times there in the old study which
Jo called `the church of one member', and from which she came with
fresh courage, recovered cheerfulness, and a more submissive spirit.
For the parents who had taught one child to meet death without fear,
were trying now to teach another to accept life without despondency
or distrust, and to use its beautiful opportunities with gratitude
and power.

     Other helps had Jo--humble, wholesome duties and delights that
would not be denied their part in serving her, and which she slowly
learned to see and value.  Brooms and dishcloths never could
be as distasteful as they once had been, for Beth had presided
over both, and something of her housewifely spirit seemed to
linger around the little mop and the old brush, never thrown
away.  As she used them, Jo found herself humming the songs
Beth used to hum, imitating Beth's orderly ways, and giving the
little touches here and there that kept everything fresh and
cozy, which was the first step toward making home happy, though
she didn't know it till Hannah said with an approving squeeze
of the hand . . .

     "You thoughtful creeter, you're determined we shan't miss
that dear lamb ef you can help it.  We don't say much, but we
see it, and the Lord will bless you for't, see ef He don't."

     As they sat sewing together, Jo discovered how much improved
her sister Meg was, how well she could talk, how much she knew
about good, womanly impulses, thoughts, and feelings, how happy
she was in husband and children, and how much they were all doing
for each other.

     "Marriage is an excellent thing, after all.  I wonder if I
should blossom out half as well as you have, if I tried it?" said
Jo, as she constructed a kite for Demi in the topsy-turvy nursery.

     "It's just what you need to bring out the tender womanly half
of your nature, Jo.  You are like a chestnut burr, prickly outside,
but silky-soft within, and a sweet kernal, if one can only get at
it.  Love will make you show your heart one day, and then the rough
burr will fall off."

     "Frost opens chestnut burrs, ma`am, and it takes a good shake
to bring them down.  Boys go nutting, and I don't care to be bagged
by them," returned Jo, pasting away at the kite which no wind that
blows would ever carry up, for Daisy had tied herself on as a bob.

     Meg laughed, for she was glad to see a glimmer of Jo's old
spirit, but she felt it her duty to enforce her opinion by every
argument in her power, and the sisterly chats were not wasted, es-
pecially as two of Meg's most effective arguments were the babies,
whom Jo loved tenderly.  Grief is the best opener of some hearts,
and Jo's was nearly ready for the bag.  A little more sunshine to
ripen the nut, then, not a boy's impatient shake, but a man's hand
reached up to pick it gently from the burr, and find the kernal
sound and sweet.  If she suspected this, she would have shut up
tight, and been more prickly than ever, fortunately she wasn't
thinking about herself, so when the time came, down she dropped.

     Now, if she had been the heroine of a moral storybook, she
ought at this period of her life to have become quite saintly,
renounced the world, and gone about doing good in a mortified
bonnet, with tracts in her pocket.  But, you see, Jo wasn't a
heroine, she was only a struggling human girl like hundreds of
others, and she just acted out her nature, being sad, cross, list-
less, or energetic, as the mood suggested.  It's highly virtuous
to say we'll be good, but we can't do it all at once, and it takes
a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull all together before some
of us even get our feet set in the right way.  Jo had got so far,
she was learning to do her duty, and to feel unhappy if she did
not, but to do it cheerfully, ah, that was another thing!  She
had often said she wanted to do something splendid, no matter how
hard, and now she had her wish, for what could be more beautiful
than to devote her life to Father and Mother, trying to make home
as happy to them as they had to her?  And if difficulties were
necessary to increase the splendor of the effort, what could be
harder for a restless, ambitious girl than to give up her own
hopes, plans, and desires, and cheerfully live for others?

     Providence had taken her at her word.  Here was the task, not
what she had expected, but better because self had no part in it.
Now, could she do it?  She decided that she would try, and in her
first attempt she found the helps I have suggested.  Still another
was given her, and she took it, not as a reward, but as a comfort,
as Christian took the refreshment afforded by the little arbor
where he rested, as he climbed the hill called Difficulty.

     "Why don't you write?  That always used to make you happy,"
said her mother once, when the desponding fit over-shadowed Jo.

     "I've no heart to write, and if I had, nobody cares for my
things."

     "We do.  Write something for us, and never mind the rest of
the world.  Try it, dear.  I'm sure it would do you good, and
please us very much."

     "Don't believe I can."  But Jo got out her desk and began to
overhaul her half-finished manuscripts.

     An hour afterward her mother peeped in and there she was,
scratching away, with her black pinafore on, and an absorbed ex-
pression, which caused Mrs. March to smile and slip away, well
pleased with the success of her suggestion.  Jo never knew how it
happened, but something got into that story that went straight to
the hearts of those who read it, for when her family had laughed
and cried over it, her father sent it, much against her will, to
one of the popular magazines, and to her utter surprise, it was
not only paid for, but others requested.  Letters from several
persons, whose praise was honor, followed the appearance of the
little story, newspapers copied it, and strangers as well as friends,
admired it.  For a small thing it was a great success, and Jo was
more astonished than when her novel was commended and condemned
all at once.

     "I don't understand it.  What can there be in a simple little
story like that to make people praise it so?" she said, quite be-
wildered.

     "There is truth in it, Jo, that's the secret.  Humor and pathos
make it alive, and you have found your style at last.  You wrote
with not thoughts of fame and money, and put your heart into it,
my daughter.  You have had the bitter, now comes the sweet.  Do
your best, and grow as happy as we are in your success."

     "If there is anything good or true in what I write, it isn't
mine.  I owe it all to you and Mother and Beth," said Jo, more
touched by her father's words than by any amount of praise from
the world.

     So taught by love and sorrow, Jo wrote her little stories,
and sent them away to make friends for themselves and her, finding
it a very charitable world to such humble wanderers, for they were
kindly welcomed, and sent home comfortable tokens to their mother,
like dutiful children whom good fortune overtakes.

     When Amy and Laurie wrote of their engagement, Mrs. March
feared that Jo would find it difficult to rejoice over it, but
her fears were soon set at rest, for thought Jo looked grave at
first, she took it very quietly, and was full of hopes and plans
for `the children' before she read the letter twice.  It was a
sort of written duet, wherein each glorified the other in lover-
like fashion, very pleasant to read and satisfactory to think of,
for no one had any objection to make.

     "You like it, Mother?" said Jo, as they laid down the closely
written sheets and looked at one another.

     "Yes, I hoped it would be so, ever since Amy wrote that she
had refused Fred. I felt sure then that something better than
what you call the `mercenary spirit' had come over her, and a
hint here and there in her letters made me suspect that love
and Laurie would win the day."

     "How sharp you are, Marmee, and how silent!  You never said
a worked to me."

     "Mothers have need of sharp eyes and discreet tongues when
they have girls to manage.  I was half afraid to put the idea
into your head, lest you should write and congratulate them be-
fore the thing was settled."

     "I'm not the scatterbrain I was.  You may trust me.  I'm
sober and sensible enough for anyone's confidante now."

     "So you are, my dear, and I should have made you mine,
only I fancied it might pain you to learn that your Teddy loved
someone else."

     "Now, Mother, did you really think I could be so silly and
selfish, after I'd refused his love, when it was freshest, if not
best?"

     "I knew you were sincere then, Jo, but lately I have thought
that if he came back, and asked again, you might perhaps, feel like
giving another answer.  Forgive me, dear, I can't help seeing that
you are very lonely, and sometimes there is a hungry look in your
eyes that goes to  my heart.  So I fancied that your boy might fill
the empty place if he tried now."

     "No, Mother, it is better as it ia, and I'm glad Amy has learned
to love him.  But you are right in one thing.  I am lonely, and per-
haps if Teddy had tried again, I might have said `Yes', not because
I love him any more, but because I care more to be loved than when
he went away."

     "I'm glad of that, Jo, for it shows that you are getting on.
There are plenty to love you, so try to be satisfied with Father
and Mother, sisters and brothers, friends and babies, till the
best lover of all comes to give you your reward."

     "Mothers are the best lovers in the world, but I don't mind
whispering to Marmee that I'd like to try all kinds.  It's very
curious, but the more I try to satisfy myself with all sorts of
natural affections, the more I seem to want.  I'd no idea hearts
could take in so many.  Mine is so elastic, it never seems full
now, and I used to be quite contented with my family.  I don't
understand it."

     "I do."  And Mrs. March smiled her wise smile, as Jo turned
back the leaves to read what Amy said of Laurie.

     "It is so beautiful to be loved as Laurie loves me. He isn't
sentimental, doesn't say much about it, but I see and feel it in
all he says and does, and it makes me so happy and so humble that
I don't seem to be the same girl I was.  I never knew how good and
generous and tender he was till now, for he lets me read his heart,
and I find it full of noble impulses and hopes and purposes, and
am so proud to know it's mine.  He says he feels as if he `could
make a prosperous voyage now with me aboard as mate, and lots of
love for ballast'.  I pray he may, and try to be all he believes
me, for I love my gallant captain with all my heart and soul and
might, and never will desert him, while God lets us be together.
Oh, Mother, I never knew how much like heaven this world could be,
when two people love and live for one another!"

     "And that's our cool, reserved, and worldly Amy!  Truly, love
does work miracles.  How very, very happy they must be!" And Jo
laid the rustling sheets together with a careful hand, as one
might shut the covers of a lovely romance, which holds the reader
fast till the end comes, and he finds himself alone in the work-
aday world again.

     By-and-by Jo roamed away upstairs, for it was rainy, and she
could not walk.  A restless spirit possessed her, and the old
feeling came again, not bitter as it once was, but a sorrowfully
patient wonder why one sister should have all she asked, the other
nothing.  It was not true, she knew that and tried to put it away,
but the natural craving for affection was strong, and Amy's hap-
piness woke the hungry longing for someone to `love with heart
and soul, and cling to while God let them be together'.

     Up in the garret, where Jo's unquiet wanderings ended stood
four little wooden chests in a row, each marked with its owners
name, and each filled with relics of the childhood and girlhood
ended now for all.  Jo glanced into them, and when she came to
her own, leaned her chin on the edge, and stared absently at the
chaotic collection, till a bundle of old exercise books caught
her eye.  She drew them out, turned them over, and relived that
pleasant winter at kind Mrs. Kirke's.  She had smiled at first,
then she looked thoughtful, next sad, and when she came to a
little message written in the Professor's hand, her lips began
to tremble, the books slid out of her lap, and she sat looking
at the friendly words, as they took a new meaning, and touched
a tender spot in her heart.

     "Wait for me, my friend.  I may be a little late, but I shall
surely come."

     "Oh, if he only would!  So kine, so good, so patient with me
always, my dear old Fritz.  I didn't value him half enough when I
had him, but now how I should love to see him, for everyone seems
going away from me, and I'm all alone."

     And holding the little paper fast, as if it were a promise
yet to be fulfilled, Jo laid her head down on a comfortable rag
bag, and cried, as if in opposition to the rain pattering on the
roof.

     Was it all self-pity, loneliness, or low spirits?  Or was it
the waking up of a sentiment which had bided its time as patiently
as its inspirer?  Who shall say?


                    CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

     Jo was alone in the twilight, lying on the old sofa, looking
at the fire, and thinking.  It was her favorite way of spending
the hour of dusk.  No one disturbed her, and she used to lie
there on Beth's little red pillow, planning stories, dreaming
dreams, or thinking tender thoughts of the sister who never seemed
far away.  Her face looked tired, grave, and rather sad, for to-
morrow was her birthday, and she was thinking how fast the years
went by, how old she was getting, and how little she seemed to
have accomplished.  Almost twenty-five, and nothing to show for
it.  Jo was mistaken in that.  There was a good deal to show,
and by-and-by she saw, and was grateful for it.

     "An old maid, that's what I'm to be.  A literary spinster,
with a pen for a spouse, a family of stories for children, and
twenty years hence a morsel of fame, perhaps, when, like poor
Johnson, I'm old and can't enjoy it, solitary, and can't share
it, independent, and don't need it.  Well, I needn't be a sour
saint nor a selfish sinner, and, I dare say, old maids are very
comfortable when they get used to it, but . . ."  And there Jo
sighed, as if the prospect was not inviting.

     It seldom is, at first, and thirty seems the end of all things
to five-and-twenty.  But it's not as bad as it looks, and one can
get on quite happily if one has something in one's self to fall
back upon.  At twenty-five, girls begin to talk about being old
maids, but secretly resolve that they never will be.  At thirty
they say nothing about it, but quietly accept the fact, and if
sensible, console themselves by remembering that they have twenty
more useful, happy years, in which they may be learning to grow
old gracefully.  Don't laugh at the spinsters, dear girls, for
often very tender, tragic romances are hidden away in the hearts
that beat so quietly under the sober gowns, and many silent sac-
rifices of youth, health, ambition, love itself, make the faded
faces beautiful in God's sight.  Even the sad, sour sisters
should be kindly dealt with, because they have missed the sweet-
est part of life, if for no other reason.  And looking at them
with compassion, not contempt, girls in their bloom should re-
member that they too may miss the blossom time.  That rosy cheeks
don't last forever, that silver threads will come in the bonnie
brown hair, and that, by-and-by, kindness and respect will be as
sweet as love and admiration now.

     Gentlemen, which means boys, be courteous to the old maids,
no matter how poor and plain and prim, for the only chivalry
worth having is that which is the readiest to pay deference to
the old, protect the feeble, and serve womankind, regardless of
rank, age, or color.  Just recollect the good aunts who have not
only lectured and fussed, but nursed and petted, too often with-
out thanks, the scrapes they have helped you out of, the tips
they have given you from their small store, the stitches the
patient old fingers have set for you, the steps the willing old
feet have taken, and gratefully pay the dear old ladies the little
attentions that women love to receive as long as they live.  The
bright-eyed girls are quick to see such traits, and will like you
all the better for them, and if death, almost the only power that
can part mother and son, should rob you of yours, you will be sure
to find a tender welcome and maternal cherishing from some Aunt
Priscilla, who has kept the warmest corner of her lonely old heart
for `the best nevvy in the world'.

     Jo must have fallen asleep (as I dare say my reader has dur-
ing this little homily), for suddenly Laurie's ghost seemed to
stand before her, a substantial, lifelike ghost, leaning over her
with the very look he used to wear when he felt a good deal and
didn't like to show it.  But, like Jenny in the ballad . . .

                      She could not think it he,

and lay staring up at him in startled silence, till he stooped
and kissed her.  Then she knew him, and flew up, crying joyfully . ..

     "Oh my Teddy!  Oh my Teddy!"

     "Dear Jo, you are glad to see me, then?"

     "Glad!  My blessed boy, words can't express my gladness.
Where's Amy?"

     "Your mother has got her down at Meg's.  We stopped there by
the way, and there was no getting my wife out of their clutches."

     "Your what?" cried Jo, for Laurie uttered those two words
with an unconscious pride and satisfaction which betrayed him.

     "Oh, the dickens!  Now I've done it."  And he looked so
guilty that Jo was down on him like a flash.

     "You've gone and got married!"

     "Yes, please, but I never will again."  And he went down
upon his knees, with a penitent clasping of hands, and a face
full of mischief, mirth, and triumph.

     "Actually married?"

     "Very much so, thank you."

     "Mercy on us.  What dreadful thing will you do next?"  And
Jo fell into her seat with a gasp.

     "A characteristic, but not exactly complimentary, congrat-
ulation," returned Laurie, still in an abject attitude, but beam-
ing with satisfaction.

     "What can you expect, when you take one's breath away, creep-
ing in like a burglar, and letting cats out of bags like that? Get
up, you ridiculous boy, and tell me all about it."

     "Not a word, unless you let me come in my old place, and
promise not to barricade."

     Jo laughed at that as she had not done for many a long day,
and patted the sofa invitingly, as she said in a cordial tone,
"The old pillow is up garret, and we don't need it now.  So, come
and fess, Teddy."

     "How good it sounds to hear you say `Teddy'! No one ever calls
me that but you."  And Laurie sat down with an air of great content.

     "What does Amy call you?"

     "My lord."

     "That's like her.  Well, you look it."  And Jo's eye plainly
betrayed that she found her boy comelier than ever.

     The pillow was gone, but there was a barricade, nevertheless,
a natural one, raised by time absence, and change of heart.  Both
felt it, and for a minute looked at one another as if that invis-
ible barrier cast a little shadow over them.  It was gone directly
however, for Laurie said, with a vain attempt at dignity . . .

     "Don't I look like a married man and the head of a family?"

     "Not a bit, and you never will.  You've grown bigger and
bonnier, but you are the same scapegrace as ever."

     "Now really, Jo, you ought to treat me with more respect,"
began Laurie, who enjoyed it all immensely.

     "How can I, when the mere idea of you, married and settled,
is so irresistibly funny that I can't keep sober!"  answered Jo,
smiling all over her face, so infectiously that they had another
laugh, and then settled down for a good talk, quite in the plea-
sant old fashion.

     "It's no use your going out in the cold to get Amy, for
they are all coming up presently.  I couldn't wait. I wanted to
be the one to tell you the grand surprise, and have `first skim'
as we used to say when we squabbled about the cream."

     "Of course you did, and spoiled your story by beginning at
the wrong end.  Now, start right, and tell me how it all happened.
I'm pining to know."

     "Well, I did it to please Amy," began Laurie,with a twinkle
that made Jo exclaim . . .

     "Fib number one.  Amy did it to please you.  Go on, and tell
the truth, if you can, sir."

     "Now she's beginning to marm it.  Isn't it jolly to hear her?"
said Laurie to the fire, and the fire glowed and sparkled as if it
quite agreed.  "It's all the same, you know, she and I being one.
We planned to come home with the Carrols, a month or more ago, but
they suddenly changed their minds, and decided to pass another
winter in Paris.  But Grandpa wanted to come home.  He went to please
me, and I couldn't let him go along, neither could I leave Amy, and
Mrs. Carrol had got English notions about chaperons and such non-
sense, and wouldn't let Amy come with us.  So I just settled the
difficulty by saying, `Let's be married, and then we can do as we
like'."

     "Of course you did.  You always have things to suit you."

     "Not always."  And something in Laurie's voice made Jo say
hastily . . .

     "How did you ever get Aunt to agree?"

     "It was hard work, but between us, we talked her over, for we
had heaps of good reasons on our side.  There wasn't time to write
and ask leave, but you all liked it, had consented to it by-and-by,
and it was only `taking time by the fetlock', as my wife says."

     "Aren't we proud of those two word, and don't we like to say
them?" interrupted Jo, addressing the fire in her turn, and watch-
ing with delight the happy light it seemed to kindle in the eyes
that had been so tragically gloomy when she saw them last.

     "A trifle, perhaps, she's such a captivating little woman I
can't help being proud of her.  Well, then Uncle and Aunt were
there to play propriety.  We were so absorbed in one another we
were of no mortal use apart, and that charming arrangement would
make everything easy all round, so we did it."

     "When, where, how?" asked Jo, in a fever of feminine interest
and curiosity, for she could not realize it a particle.

     "Six weeks ago, at the American consul's, in Paris, a very
quiet wedding of course, for even in our happiness we didn't for-
get dear little Beth."

     Jo put her hand in his as he said that, and Laurie gently
smoothed the little red pillow, which he remembered well.

     "Why didn't you let us know afterward?" asked Jo, in a
quieter tone, when they had sat quite still a minute.

     "We wanted to surprise you.  We thought we were coming
directly home, at first, but the dear old gentleman, as soon as
we were married, found he couldn't be ready under a month, at
least, and sent us off to spend our honeymoon wherever we liked.
Amy had once called Valrosa a regular honeymoon home, so we went
there, and were as happy as people are but once in their lives.
My faith!  Wasn't it love among the roses!"

     Laurie seemed to forget Jo for a minute, and Jo was glad of
it, for the fact that he told her these things so freely and so
naturally assured her that he had quite forgiven and forgotten.
She tried to draw away her hand, but as if he guessed the thought
that prompted the half-involuntary impulse, Laurie held it fast,
and said, with a manly gravity she had never seen in him before . . .

     "Jo, dear, I want to say one thing, and then we'll put it by
forever.  As I told you in my letter when I wrote that Amy had
been so kind to me, I never shall stop loving you, but the love
is altered, and I have learned to see that it is better as it is.
Amy and you changed places in my heart, that's all.  I think it
was meant to be so, and would have come about naturally, if I had
waited, as you tried to make me, but I never could be patient, and
so I got a heartache.  I was a boy then, headstrong and violent,
and it took a hard lesson to show me my mistake.  For it was one,
Jo, as you said, and I found it out, after making a fool of myself.
Upon my word, I was so tumbled up in my mind, at one time, that I
didn't know which I loved best, you or Amy, and tried to love you
both alike.  But I couldn't, and when I saw her in Switzerland,
everything seemed to clear up all at once.  You both got into
your right places, and I felt sure that it was well off with the
old love before it was on with the new, that I could honestly
share my heart between sister Jo and wife Amy, and love them dearly.
Will you believe it, and go back to the happy old times when we
first knew one another?"

     "I'll believe it, with all my heart, but, Teddy, we never can
be boy and girl again. The happy old times can't come back, and we
mustn't expect it.  We are man and woman now, with sober work to do,
for playtime is over, and we must give up frolicking. I'm sure you
feel this.  I see the change in you, and you'll find it in me.  I
shall miss my boy, but I shall love the man as much, and admire
him more, because he means to be what I hoped he would.  We can't
be little playmates any longer, but we will be brother and sister,
to love and help one another all our lives, won't we, Laurie?"

     He did not say a word, but took the hand she offered him, and
laid his face down on it for a minute, feeling that out of the
grave of a boyish passion, there had risen a beautiful, strong
friendship to bless them both.  Presently Jo said cheerfully, for
she didn't the coming home to be a sad one, "I can't make it true
that you children are really married and going to set up house-
keeping.  Why, it seems only yesterday that I was buttoning Amy's
pinafore, and pulling your hair when you teased.  Mercy me, how
time does fly!"

     "As one of the children is older than yourself, you needn't
talk so like a grandma.  I flatter myself I'm a `gentleman growed'
as Peggotty said of David, and when you see Amy, you'll find her
rather a precocious infant," said Laurie, looking amused at her
maternal air.

     "You may be a little older in years, but I'm ever so much
older in feeling, Teddy.  Women always are, and this last year has
been such a hard one that I feel forty."

     "Poor Jo!  We left you to bear it alone, while we went plea-
suring.  You are older.  Here's a line, and there's another.  Unless
you smile, your eyes look sad, and when I touched the cushion, just
now, I found a tear on it.  You've had a great deal to bear, and
had to bear it all alone.  What a selfish beast I've been!"  And
Laurie pulled his own hair, with a remorseful look.

     But Jo only turned over the traitorous pillow, and answered,
in a tone which she tried to make more cheerful, "No, I had Father
and Mother to help me, and the dear babies to comfort me, and the
thought that you and Amy were safe and happy, to make the troubles
here easier to bear.  I am lonely, sometimes, but I dare say it's
good for me, and . . ."

     "You never shall be again," broke in Laurie, putting his arm
about her, as if to fence out every human ill. "Amy and I can't
get on without you, so you must come and teach `the children' to
keep house, and go halves in everything, just as we used to do,
and let us pet you, and all be blissfully happy and friendly
together."

     "If I shouldn't be in the way, it would be very pleasant. I
begin to feel quite young already, for somehow all my troubles
seemed to fly away when you came.  You always were a comfort, Teddy."
And Jo leaned her head on his shoulder, just as she did years ago,
when Beth lay ill and Laurie told her to hold on to him.

     He looked down at her, wondering if she remembered the time,
but Jo was smiling to herself, as if in truth her troubles had
all vanished at his coming.

     "You are the same Jo still, dropping tears about one minute,
and laughing the next.  You look a little wicked now.  What is it,
Grandma?"

     "I was wondering how you and Amy get on together."

     "Like angels!"

     "Yes, of course, but which rules?"

     "I don't mind telling you that she does now, at least I let
her think so, it pleases her, you know.  By-and-by we shall take
turns, for marriage, they say, halves one's rights and doubles
one's duties."

     "You'll go on as you begin, and Amy will rule you all the
days of your life."

     "Well, she does it so imperceptibly that I don't think I shall
mind much.  She is the sort of woman who knows how to rule well. In
fact, I rather like it, for she winds one round her finger as softly
and prettily as a skein of silk, and makes you feel as if she was
doing you a favor all the while."

     "That ever I should live to see you a henpecked husband and
enjoying it!" cried JO, with uplifted hands.

     It was good to see Laurie square his shoulders, and smile with
masculine scorn at that insinuation, as he replied, with his "high
and mighty" air, "Amy is too well-bred for that, and I am not the
sort of man to submit to it.  My wife and I respect ourselves and
one another too much ever to tyrannize or quarrel."

     Jo like that, and thought the new dignity very becoming, but
the boy seemed changing very fast into the man, and regret mingled
with her pleasure.

     "I am sure of that.  Amy and you never did quarrel as we used
to.  She is the sun and I the wind, in the fable, and the sun man-
aged the man best, you remember."

     "She can blow him up as well as shine on him," laughed Laurie.
"such a lecture as I got at Nice!  I give you my word it was a deal
worse than any or your scoldings, a regular rouser.  I'll tell you
all about it sometime, she never will, because after telling me that
she despised and was ashamed of me, she lost her heart to the de-
spicable party and married the good-for-nothing."

     "What baseness!  Well, if she abuses you, come to me, and I'll
defend you."

     "I look as if I needed it, don't I?" said Laurie, getting up
and striking an attitude which suddenly changed from the imposing
to the rapturous, as Amy's voice was heard calling, "Where is she?
Where's my dear old Jo?"

     In trooped the whole family, and everyone was hugged and kissed
all over again, and after several vain attempts, the three wanderers
were set down to be looked at and exulted over.  Mr. Laurence, hale
and hearty as ever, was quite as much improved as the others by his
foreign tour, for the crustiness seemed to be nearly gone, and the
old-fashioned courtliness had received a polish which made it kind-
lier than ever.  It was good to see him beam at `my children', as
he called the young pair.  It was better still to see Amy pay him
the daughterly duty and affection which completely won his old heart,
and best of all, to watch Laurie revolve about the two, as if never
tired of enjoying the pretty picture they made.

     The minute she put her eyes upon Amy, Meg became conscious that
her own dress hadn't a Parisian air, that young Mrs. Mofffat would be
entirely eclipsed by young Mrs. Laurence, and that `her ladyship' was
altogether a most elegant and graceful woman.  Jo thought, as she
watched the pair, "How well they look together!  I was right, and
Laurie has found the beautiful, accomplished girl who will become
his home better than clumsy old Jo, and be a pride, not a torment to
him."  Mrs. March and her husband smiled and nodded at each other
with happy faces, for they saw that their youngest had done well,
not only in worldly things,but the better wealth of love, confid-
ence, and happiness.

     For Amy's face was full of the soft brightness which betokens
a peaceful heart, her voice had a new tenderness in it, and the cool,
prim carriage was changed to a gentle dignity, both womanly and win-
ning.  No little affectations marred it, and the cordial sweetness
of her manner was more charming than the new beauty or the old grace,
for it stamped her at once with the unmistakable sign of the true
gentlewoman she had hoped to become.

     "Love has done much for our little girl," said her mother softly.

     "She has had a good example before her all her life, my dear,"
Mr. March whispered back, with a loving look at the worn face and gray
head beside him.

     Daisy found it impossible to keep her eyes off her `pitty aunty',
but attached herself like a lap dog to the wonderful chatelaine full
of delightful charms.  Demi paused to consider the new relationship
before he compromised himself by the rash acceptance of a bribe, which
took the tempting form of a family of wooden bears from Berne.  A flank
movement produced an unconditional surrender, however, for Laurie knew
where to have him.

     "Young man, when I first had the honor of making your acquain-
tance you hit me in the face.  Now I demand the satisfaction of a
gentleman," and with that the tall uncle proceeded to toss and tousle
the small nephew in a way that damaged his philosophical dignity as
much as it delighted his boyish soul.

     "Blest if she ain't in silk from head to foot?  Ain't it a re-
lishin' sight to see her settin' there as fine as a fiddle, anch a happy
procession as filed away into the little dining room!  Mr. March
proudly escorted Mrs. Laurence.  Mrs. March as proudly leaned on
the arm of `my son'.  The old gentleman took Jo, with a whispered,
"You must be my girl now," and a glance at the empty corner by the
fire, that made Jo whisper back, "I'll try to fill her place, sir.

     The twins pranced behind, feeling that the millennium was at
hand, for everyone was so busy with the newcomers that they were
left to revel at their own sweet will, and you may be sure they
made the most of the opportunity.  Didn't they steal sips of tea,
stuff gingerbread ad libitum, get a hot biscuit apiece, and as a
crowning trespass, didn't they each whisk a captivating little tart
into their tiny pockets, there to stick and crumble treacherously,
teaching them that both human nature and a pastry are frail?  Bur-
dened with the guilty consciousness of the sequestered tarts, and
fearing that Dodo's sharp eyes would pierce the thin disguise of
cambric and merino which hid their booty, the little sinners
attached themselves to `Dranpa', who hadn't his spectacles on. Amy,
who was handed about like refreshments, returned to the parlor on
Father Laurence's arm.  The others paired off as before, and this
arrangement left Jo companionless. She did not mind it at the
minute, for she lingered to answer Hannah's eager inquiry.

     "Will Miss Amy ride in her coop (coupe), and use all them
lovely silver dishes that's stored away over yander?"

     "Shouldn't wonder if she drove six white horses, ate off gold
plate, and wore diamonds and point lace every day.  Teddy thinks
nothing too good for her," returned Jo with infinite satisfaction.

     "No more there is!  Will you have hash or fishballs for break-
fast?" asked Hannah, who wisely mingled poetry and prose.

     "I don't care."  And Jo shut the door, feeling that food was an
uncongenial topic just then.  She stood a minute looking at the
party vanishing above, and as Demi's short plaid legs toiled up the
last stair, a sudden sense of lonliness came over her so strongly
that she looked about her with dim eyes, as if to find something to
lean upon, for even Teddy had deserted her.  If she had known what
birthday gift was coming every minute nearer and nearer, she would
not have said to herself, "I'll weep a little weep when I go to bed.
It won't do to be dismal now."  Then she drew her hand over her
eyes, for one of her boyish habits was never to know where her hand-
kerchief was, and had just managed to call up a smile when there
came a knock at the porch door.

     She opened with hospitable haste, and started as if another
ghost had come to surprise her, for there stood a tall bearded
gentleman, beaming on her from the darkness like a midnight sun.

     "Oh, Mr. Bhaer, I am so glad to see you!" cried Jo, with a
clutch, as if she feared the night would swallow him up before
she could get him in.

     "And I to see Miss Marsch, but no, you haf a party," and the
Professor paused as the sound of voices and the tap of dancing
feet came down to them.

     "No, we haven't, only the family.  My sister and friends
have just come home, and we are all very happy.  Come in, and
make one of us."

     Though a very social man, I think Mr. Bhaer would have gone
decorously away, and come again another day, but how could he,
when Jo shut the door behind him, and bereft him of his hat?
Perhaps her face had something to do with it, for she forgot
to hide her joy at seeing him, and showed it with a frankness
that proved irresistible to the solitary man, whose welcome far
exceeded his boldest hopes.

     "If I shall not be Monsieur de Trop, I will so gladly see
them all.  You haf been ill, my friend?"

     He put the question abruptly, for, as Jo hung up his coat,
the light fell on her face, and he saw a change in it.

     "Not ill, but tired and sorrowful.  We have had trouble
since I saw you last."

     "Ah, yes, I know.  My heart was sore for you when I heard
that," And he shook hands again, with such a sympathetic face
that Jo felt as if no comfort could equal the look of the kind
eyes, the grasp of the big, warm hand.

     "Father, Mother, this is my friend, Professor Bhaer," she
said, with a face and tone of such irrepressible pride and
pleasure that she might as well have blown a trumpet and opened
the door with a flourish.

     If the stranger had any doubts about his reception, they
were set at rest in a minute by the cordial welcome he received.
Everyone greeted him kindly, for Jo's sake at first, but very
soon they liked him for his own.  They could not help it, for
he carried the talisman that opens all hearts, and these simple
people warmed to him at once, feeling even the more friendly
because he was poor. For poverty enriches those who live above
it, and is a sure passport to truly hospitable spirits.  Mr.
Bhaer sat looking about him with the air of a traveler who
knocks at a strange door, and when it opens, finds himself at
home.  The children went to him like bees to a honeypot, and
establishing themselves on each knee, proceeded to captivate him
by rifling his pockets, pulling his beard, and investigating his
watch, with juvenile audacity.  The women telegraphed their
approval to one another, and Mr. March, feeling that he had got
a kindred spirit, opened his choicest stores for his guest's
benefit, while silent John listened and enjoyed the talk, but
said not a word, and Mr. Laurence found it impossible to go to
sleep.

     If Jo had not been otherwise engaged, Laurie's behavior
would have amused her, for a faint twinge, not of jealousy, but
something like suspicion, caused that gentleman to stand aloof
at first, and observe the newcomer with brotherly circumspection.
But it did not last long.  He got interested in spite of himself,
and before he knew it, was drawn into the circle.  For Mr. Bhaer
talked well in this genial atmosphere, and did himself justice.
He seldom spoke to Laurie, but he looked at him often, and a
shadow would pass across his face, as if regretting his own lost
youth, as he watched the young man in his prime.  Then his eyes
would turn to Jo so wistfully that she would have surely answered
the mute inquiry if she had seen it.  But Jo had her own eyes to
take care of, and feeling that they could not be trusted, she
prudently kept them on the little sock she was knitting, like a
model maiden aunt.

     A stealthy glance now and then refreshed her like sips of
fresh water after a dusty walk, for the sidelong peeps showed
her several propitious omens.  Mr. Bhaer's face had lost the
absent-minded expression, and looked all alive with interest in
the present moment, actually young and handsome, she thought,
forgetting to compare him with Laurie, as she usually did strange
men, to their great detriment. Then he seemed quite inspired,
though the burial customs of the ancients, to which the conver-
sation had strayed, might not be considered an exhilarating
topic.  Jo quite glowed with triumph when Teddy got quenched in
an argument, and thought to herself, as she watched her father's
absorbed face, "How he would enjoy having such a man as my Pro-
fessor to talk with every day!" Lastly, Mr. Bhaer was dressed
in a new suit of black, which made him look more like a gentleman
than ever.  His bushy hair had been cut and smoothly brushed, but
didn't stay in order long, for in exciting moments, he rumpled
it up in the droll way he used to do, and Jo liked it rampantly
erect better than flat, because she thought it gave his fine
forehead a Jove-like aspect.  Poor Jo, how she did glorify that
plain man, as she sat knitting away so quietly, yet letting
nothing escape her, not even the fact that Mr. Bhaer actually
had gold sleeve-buttons in his immaculate wristbands.

     "Dear old fellow!  He couldn't have got himself up with
more care if he'd been going a-wooing," said Jo to herself, and
then a sudden thought born of the words made her blush so dread-
fully that she had to drop her ball, and go down after it to
hide her face.

     The maneuver did not succeed as well as she expected, how-
ever, for though just in the act of setting fire to a funeral
pyre, the Professor dropped his torch, metaphorically speaking,
and made a dive after the little blue ball.  Of course they
bumped their heads smartly together, saw stars, and both came
up flushed and laughing, without the ball, to resume their seats,
wishing they had not left them.

     Nobody knew where the evening went to, for Hannah skillfully
abstracted the babies at an early hour, nodding like two rosy
poppies, and Mr. Laurence went home to rest.  The others sat
round the fire, talking away, utterly regardless of the lapse
of time, till Meg, whose maternal was impressed with a firm con-
viction that Daisy had tumbled out of be, and Demi set his night-
gown afire studying the structure of matches, made a move to go.

     "We must have our sing, in the good old way, for we are all
together again once more," said Jo, feeling that a good shout
would be a safe and pleasant vent for the jubilant emotions of
her soul.

     They were not all there.  But no one found the words thougt-
less or untrue, for Beth still seemed among them, a peaceful
presence, invisible, but dearer than ever, since death could not
break the household league that love made disoluble.  The little
chair stood in its old place.  The tidy basket, with the bit of
work she left unfinished when the needle grew `so heavy', was
still on its accustomed shelf.  The beloved instrument, seldom
touched now had not been moved, and above it Beth's face, serene
and smiling, as in the early days, looked down upon them, seeming
to say, "Be happy.  I am here."

     "Play something, Amy.  Let them hear how much you have im-
proved," said Laurie, with pardonable pride in his promising
pupil.

     But Amy whispered, with full eyes, as she twirled the faded
stool, "Not tonight, dear.  I can't show off tonight."

     But she did show something better than brilliancy or skill,
for she sang Beth's songs with a tender music in her voice which
the best master could not have taught, and touched the listener's
hearts with a sweeter power than any other inspiration could have
given her.  The room was very still, when the clear voice failed
suddenly at the last line of Beth's favorite hymn.  It was hard
to say . . .

           Earth hath no sorrow that heaven cannot heal;

and Amy leaned against her husband, who stood behind her, feeling
that her welcome home was not quite perfect without Beth's kiss.

     "Now, we must finish with Mignon's song, for Mr. Bhaer sings
that," said Jo, before the pause grew painful.  And Mr. Bhaer
cleared his throat with a gratified "Hem!" as he stepped into the
corner where Jo stood, saying . . .

     "You will sing with me?  We go excellently well together."

     A pleasing fiction, by the way, for Jo had no more idea of
music than a grasshopper.  But she would have consented if he had
proposed to sing a whole opera, and warbled away, blissfully re-
gardless of time and tune.  It didn't much matter, for Mr. Bhaer
sang like a true German, heartily and well, and Jo soon subsided
into a subdued hum, that she might listen to the mellow voice that
seemed to sing for her alone.

         Know'st thou the land where the citron blooms,

used to be the Professor's favorite line, for `das land' meant
Germany to him, but now he seemed to dwell, with peculiar warmth
and melody, upon the words . . .

             There, oh there, might I with thee,
             O, my beloved, go

and one listener was so thrilled by the tender invitation that she
longed to say she did know the land, and would joyfully depart
thither whenever he liked

     The song was considered a great success, and the singer retired
covered with laurels.  But a few minutes afterward, he forgot his
manners entirely, and stared at Amy putting on her bonnet, for she
had been introduced simply as `my sister', and on one had called
her by her new name since her came.  He forgot himself still fur-
ther when Laurie said, in his most gracious manner, at parting . . .

     "My wife and I are very glad to meet you, sir.  Please remem-
ber that there is always a welcome waiting for you over the way."

     Then the Professor thanked him so heartily, and looked so
suddenly illuminated with satisfaction, that Laurie thought him
the most delightfully demonstrative old fellow he ever met.

     "I too shall go, but I shall gladly come again, if you will
gif me leave, dear madame, for a little business in the city will
keep me here some days."

     He spoke to Mrs. March, but he looked at Jo, and the mother's
voice gave as cordial an assent as did the daughter's eyes, for
Mrs. March was not so blind to her children's interest as Mrs.
Moffat supposed.

     "I suspect that is a wise man," remarked Mr. March, with
placid satisfaction, from the hearthrug, after the last guest had
gone.

     "I know he is a good one," added Mrs. March, with decided
approval, as she wound up the clock.

     "I thought you'd like him," was all Jo said, as she slipped
away to her bed.

     She wondered what the business was that brought Mr. Bhaer to
the city, and finally decided that he had been appointed to some
great honor, somewhere, but had been too modest to mention the
fact.  If she had seen his face when, safe in his own room, he
looked at the picture of a severe and rigid young lady, with a
good deal of hair, who appeared to be gazing darkly into futurity,
it might have thrown some light upon the subject, especially when
he turned off the gas, and kissed the picture in the dark.


                    CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

     "Please, Madam Mother, could you lend me my wife for half
an hour?  The luggage has come, and I've been making hay of
Amy's Paris finery, trying to find some things I want," said
Laurie, coming in the next day to find Mrs. Laurence sitting
in her mother's lap, as if being made `the baby' again.

     "Certainly.  Go, dear, I forgot that you have any home but
this." And Mrs. March pressed the white hand that wore the wed-
ding ring, as if asking pardon for her maternal covetousness.

     "I shouldn't have come over if I could have helped it, but
I can't get on without my little woman any more than a . . ."

     "Weathercock can without the wind," suggested Jo, as he
paused for a simile.  Jo had grown quite her own saucy self
again since Teddy came home.

     "Exactly, for Amy keeps me pointing due west most of the
time, with only an occasional whiffle round to the south, and
I haven't had an easterly spell since I was married.  Don't know
anything about the north, but am altogether salubrious and balmy,
hey, my lady?"

     "Lovely weather so far.  I don't know how long it will last,
but I'm not afraid of storms, for I'm learning how to sail my
ship.  Come home, dear, and I'll find your bootjack.  I suppose
that's what you are rummaging after among my things.  Men are so
helpless, Mother," said Amy, with a matronly air, which delighted
her husband.

     "What are you going to do with yourselves after you get set-
tled?" asked Jo, buttoning Amy's cloak as she used to button her
pinafores.

     "We have our plans.  We don't mean to say much about them
yet, because we are such very new brooms, but we don't intend to
be idle.  I'm going into business with a devotion that shall de-
light Grandfather, and prove to him that I'm not spoiled.  I need
something of the sort to keep me steady.  I'm tired of dawdling,
and mean to work like a man."

     "And Amy, what is she going to do?" asked Mrs. March, well
pleased at Laurie's decision and the energy with which he spoke.

     "After doing the civil all round, and airing our best bonnet,
we shall astonish you by the elegant hospitalities of our mansion,
the brilliant society we shall draw about us, and the beneficial
influence we shall exert over the world at large.  That's about
it, isn't it, Madame Recamier?" asked Laurie with a quizzical
look at Amy.

     "Time will show.  Come away, Impertinence, and don't shock
my family by calling me names before their faces," answered Amy,
resolving that there should be a home with a good wife in it
before she set up a salon as a queen of society.

     "How happy those children seem together!" observed Mr. March,
finding it difficult to become absorbed in his Aristotle after
the young couple had gone.

     "Yes, and I think it will last," added Mrs. March, with the
restful expression of a pilot who has brought a ship safely into
port.

     "I know it will. Happy Amy!" And Jo sighed, then smiled
brightly as Professor Bhaer opened the gate with an impatient
push.

     Later in the evening, when his mind had been set at rest
about the bootjack, Laurie said suddenly to his wife, "Mrs.
Laurence."

     "My Lord!"

     "That man intends to marry our Jo!"

     "I hope so, don't you, dear?"

     "Well, my love, I consider him a trump, in the fullest sense
of that expressive word, but I do wish he was a little younger
and a good deal richer."

     "Now, Laurie, don't be too fastidious and worldly-minded.
If they love one another it doesn't matter a particle how old
they are nor how poor.  Women never should marry for money . . ."
Amy caught herself up short as the words escaped her, and looked
at her husband, who replied, with malicious gravity . . .

     "Certainly not, though you do hear charming girls say that
they intend to do it sometimes.  If my memory serves me, you
once thought it your duty to make a rich match.  That accounts,
perhaps, for your marrying a good-for-nothing like me."

     "Oh, my dearest boy, don't, don't say that!  I forgot you
were rich when I said `Yes'.  I'd have married you if you hadn't
a penny, and I sometimes wish you were poor that I might show
how much I love you."  And Amy, who was very dignified in public
and very fond in private, gave convincing proofs of the truth of
her words.

     "You don't really think I am such a mercenary creature as
I tried to be once, do you?  It would break my heart if you
didn't believe that I'd gladly pull in the same boat with you,
even if you had to get your living by rowing on the lake."2

     "Am I an idiot and a brute?  How could I think so, when
you refused a richer man for me, and won't let me give you half
I want to now, when I have the right?  Girls do it every day,
poor things, and are taught to think it is their only salvation,
but you had better lessons, and though I trembled for you at
one time, I was not disappointed, for the daughter was true to
the mother's teaching.  I told Mamma so yesterday, and she
looked as glad and grateful as if I'd given her a check for a
million, to be spent in charity.  You are not listening to my
moral remarks, Mrs. Laurence."  And Laurie paused, for Amy's
eyes had an absent look, though fixed upon his face.

     "Yes, I am, and admiring the mple in your chin at the
same time.  I don't wish to make you vain, but I must confess
that I'm prouder of my handsome husband than of all his money.
Don't laugh, but your nose is such a comfort to me." And Amy
softly caressed the well-cut feature with artistic satisfaction.

     Laurie had received many compliments in his life, but never
one that suited him better, as he plainly showed though he did
laugh at his wife's peculiar taste, while she said slowly, "May
I ask you a question, dear?"

     "Of course, you may."

     "Shall you care if Jo does marry Mr. Bhaer?"

     "Oh, that's the trouble is it?  I thought there was something
in the dimple that didn't quite suit you.  Not being a dog in the
manger, but the happiest fellow alive, I assure you I can dance
at Jo's wedding with a heart as light as my heels.  Do you doubt
it, my darling?"

     Amy looked up at him, and was satisfied.  Her little jealous
fear vanished forever, and she thanked him, with a face full of
love and confidence.

     "I wish we could do something for that capital old Professor.
Couldn't we invent a rich relation, who shall obligingly die out
there in Germany, and leave him a tidy little fortune?" said Laurie,
when they began to pace up and down the long drawing room, arm in
arm, as they were fond of doing, in memory of the chateau garden.

     "Jo would find us out, and spoil it all.  She is very proud
of him, just as he is, and said yesterday that she thought pov-
erty was a beautiful thing."

     "Bless her dear heart!  She won't think so when she has a
literary husband, and a dozen little professors and professorins
to support.  We won't interfere now, but watch our chance, and
do them a good turn in spite of themselves.  I owe Jo for a part
of my education, and she believes in people's paying their hon-
est debts, so I'll get round her in that way."

     "How delightful it is to be able to help others, isn't it?
That was always one of my dreams, to have the power of giving
freely, and thanks to you, the dream has come true."

     "Ah, we'll do quantities of good, won't we?  There's one
sort of poverty that I particularly like to help.  Out-and-out
beggars get taken care of, but poor gentle folks fare badly,
because they won't ask, and people don't dare to offer charity.
Yet there are a thousand ways of helping them, if one only
knows how to do it so delicately that it does not offend.   I
must say, I like to serve a decayed gentleman better than a
blarnerying beggar.  I suppose it's wrong, but I do, though it
is harder."

     "Because it takes a gentleman to do it," added the other
member of the domestic admiration society.

     "Thank you, I'm afraid I don't deserve that pretty compliment.
But I was going to say that while I was dawdling about abroad, I
saw a good many talented young fellows making all sorts of sac-
rifices, and enduring real hardships, that they might realize
their dreams.  Splendid fellows, some of them, working like heros,
poor and friendless, but so full of courage, patience, and am-
bition that I was ashamed of myself, and longed to give them a
right good lift.  Those are people whom it's a satisfaction to
help, for if they've got genius, it's an honor to be allowed to
serve them, and not let it be lost or delayed for want of fuel
to keep the pot boiling.  If they haven't, it's a pleasure to
comfort the poor souls, and keep them from despair when they find
it out."

     "Yes, indeed, and there's another class who can't ask, and
who suffer in silence.  I know something of it, for I belonged to
it before you made a princess of me, as the king does the beggar-
maid in the old story.  Ambitious girls have a hard time, Laurie,
and often have to see youth, health, and precious opportunities
go by, just for want of a little help at the right minute. People
have been very kind to me, and whenever I see girls struggling
along, as we used to do, I want to put out my hand and help them,
as I was helped."

     "And so you shall, like an angel as you are!" cried Laurie,
resolving, with a glow of philanthropic zeal, to found and en-
dow an institution for the express benefit of young women with
artistic tendencies.  "Rich people have no right to sit down
and enjoy themselves, or let their money accumulate for others
to waste.  It's not half so sensible to leave legacies when one
dies as it is to use the money wisely while alive, and enjoy
making one's fellow creatures happy with it.  We'll have a good
time ourselves, and add an extra relish to our own pleasure by
giving other people a generous taste.  Will you be a little
Dorcal, going about emptying a big basket of comforts, and
filling it up with good deeds?"

     "With all my heart, if you will be a brave St. Martin,
stopping as you ride gallantly through the world to share your
cloak with the beggar."

     "It's a bargain, and we shall get the best of it!"

     So the young pair shook hands upon it, and then paced
happily on again, feeling that their pleasant home was more
homelike because they hoped to brighten other homes, believing
that their own feet would walk more uprightly along the flowery
path before them, if they smoothed rough ways for other feet,
and feeling that their hearts were more closely knit together
by a love which could tenderly remember those less blest than
they.


                    CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

     I cannot feel that I have done my duty as humble historian
of the March family, without devoting at least one chapter to
the two most precious and important members of it.  Daisy and
Demi had now arrived at years of discretion, for in this fast
age babies of three or four assert their rights, and get them,
too, which is more than many of their elders do.  If there
ever were a pair of twins in danger of being utterly spoiled
by adoration, it was these prattling Brookes.  Of course they
were the most remarkable children ever born, as will be shown
when I mention that they walked at eight months, talked flu-
ently at twelve months, and at two years they took their places
at table, and behaved with a propriety which charmed all be-
holders.  At three, Daisy demanded a `needler', and actually
made a bag with four stitches in it.  She likewise set up
housekeeping in the sideboard, and managed a microscopic cook-
ing stove with a skill that brought tears of pride to Hannah's
eyes, while Demi learned his letters with his grandfather, who
invented a new mode of teaching the alphabet by forming letters
with his arms and legs, thus uniting gymnastics for head and
heels.  The boy early developed a mechanical genius which de-
lighted his father and distracted his mother, for he tried to
imitate every machine he saw, and kept the nursery in a chaotic
condition, with his `sewinsheen', a mysterious structure of
string, chairs, clothespins, and spools, for wheels to go
`wound and wound'.  Also a basket hung over the back of a chair,
in which he vainly tried to hoist his too confiding sister, who,
with feminine devotion, allowed her little head to be bumped till
rescued, when the young inventor indignantly remarked, "Why,
Marmar, dat's my lellywaiter, and me's trying to pull her up."

     Though utterly unlike in character, the twins got on re-
markably well together, and seldom quarreled more than thrice
a day.  Of course, Demi tyrannized over Daisy, and gallantly
defended her from every other aggressor, while Daisy made a
galley slave of herself, and adored her brother as the one per-
fect being in the world.  A rosy, chubby, sunshiny little soul
was Daisy, who found her way to everybody's heart, and nestled
there.  One of the captivating children, who seem made to be
kissed and cuddled, adorned and adored like little goddesses,
and produced for general approval on all festive occasions.
Her small virtues were so sweet that she would have been quite
angelic if a few small naughtinesses had not kept her delight-
fully human.  It was all fair weather in her world, and every
morning she scrambled up to the window in her little nightgown
to look our, and say, no matter whether it rained or shone,
"Oh, pitty day, oh, pitty day!" Everyone was a friend, and she
offered kisses to a stranger so confidingly that the most in-
veterate bachelor relented, and baby-lovers became faithful
worshipers.

     "Me loves evvybody," she once said, opening her arms, with
her spoon in one hand, and her mug in the other, as if eager to
embrace and nourish the whole world.

     As she grew, her mother began to feel that the Dovecote
would be blessed by the presence of an inmate as serene and lov-
ing as that which had helped to make the old house home, and to
pray that she might be spared a loss like that which had lately
taught them how long they had entertained an angel unawares. Her
grandfather often called her `Beth', and her grandmother watched
over her with untiring devotion, as if trying to atone for some
past mistake, which no eye but her own could see.

     Demi, like a true Yankee, was of an inquiring turn, wanting
to know everything, and often getting much disturbed because he
could not get satisfactory answers to his perpetual "What for?"

     He also possessed a philosophic bent, to the great delight of
his grandfather, who used to hold Socratic conversations with him,
in which the precocious pupil occasionally posed his teacher, to
the undisguised satisfaction of the womenfolk.

     "What makes my legs go, Dranpa?" asked the young philosopher,
surveying those active portions of his frame with a meditative air,
while resting after a go-to-bed frolic one night.

     "It's your little mind, Demi," replied the sage, stroking the
yellow head respectfully.

     "What is a little mine?"

     "It is something which makes your body move, as the spring
made the wheels go in my watch when I showed it to you."

     "Open me.  I want to see it go wound."

     "I can't do that any more than you could open the watch. God
winds you up, and you go till He stops you."

     "Does I?" And Demi's brown eyes grew big and bright as he
took in the new thought.  "Is I wounded up like the watch?"

     "Yes, but I can't show you how, for it is done when we don't
see."

     Demi felt his back, as if expecting to find it like that of
the watch, and then gravely remarked, "I dess Dod does it when
I's asleep."

     A careful explanation followed, to which he listened so at-
tentively that his anxious grandmother said, "My dear, do you
think it wise to talk about such things to that baby?  He's get-
ting great bumps over his eyes, and learning to ask the most
unanswerable questions."

     "If he is old enough to ask the question he is old enough to
receive true answers.  I am not putting the thoughts into his
head, but helping him unfold those already there.  These children
are wiser than we are, and I have no doubt the boy understands
every word I have said to him.  Now, Demi, tell me where you keep
your mind."

     If the boy had replied like Alcibiades, "By the gods, Socrates,
I cannot tell," his grandfather would not have been surprised, but
when, after standing a moment on one leg, like a meditative young
stork, he answered, in a tone of calm conviction, "In my little
belly," the old gentleman could only join in Grandma's laugh, and
dismiss the class in metaphysics.

     There might have been cause for maternal anxiety, if Demi had
not given convincing proofs that he was a true boy, as well as a
budding philosopher, for often, after a discussion which caused
Hannah to prophesy, with ominous nods, "That child ain't long for
this world," he would turn about and set her fears at rest by
some of the pranks with which dear, dirty, naughty little rascals
distract and delight their parent's souls.

     Meg made many moral rules, and tried to keep them, but what
mother was ever proof against the winning wiles, the ingenious
evasions, or the tranquil audacity of the miniature men and women
who so early show themselves accomplished Artful Dodgers?

     "No more raisins, Demi.  They'll make you sick," says Mamma
to the young person who offers his services in the kitchen with
unfailing regularity on plum-pudding day.

     "Me likes to be sick."

     "I don't want to have you, so run away and help Daisy make
patty cakes."

     He reluctantly departs, but his wrongs weigh upon his spirit,
and by-and-by when an opportunity comes to redress them, he out-
wits Mamma by a shrewd bargain.

     "Now you have been good children, and I'll play anything you
like," says Meg, as she leads her assistant cooks upstairs, when
the pudding is safely bouncing in the pot.

     "Truly, Marmar?" asks Demi, with a brilliant idea in his well-
powdered head.

     "Yes, truly.  Anything you say," replies the shortsighted par-
ent, preparing herself to sing, "The Three Little Kittens" half a
dozen times over, or to take her family to "Buy a penny bun," re-
gardless of wind or limb.  But Demi corners her by the cool reply...

     "Then we'll go and eat up all the raisins."

     Aunt Dodo was chief playmate and confidante of both children,
and the trio turned the little house topsy-turvy.  Aunt Amy was as
yet only a name to them, Aunt Beth soon faded into a pleasantly
vague memory, but Aunt Dodo was a living reality, and they made the
most of her, for which compliment she was deeply grateful.  But
when Mr. Bhaer came, Jo neglected her playfellows, and dismay and
desolation fell upon their little souls.  Daisy, who was fond of
going about peddling kisses, lost her best customer and became
bankrupt.  Demi, with infantile penetration, soon discovered that
Dodo like to play with `the bear-man' better than she did him,
but though hurt, he concealed his anguish, for he hadn't the
heart to insult a rival who kept a mine of chocolate drops in
his waistcoat pocket, and a watch that could be taken out of its
case and freely shaken by ardent admirers.

     Some persons might have considered these pleasing liberties
as bribes, but Demi didn't see it in that light, and continued to
patronize the `the bear-man' with pensive affability, while Daisy
bestowed her small affections upon him at the third call, and
considered his shoulder her throne, his arm her refuge, his gifts
treasures surpassing worth.

     Gentlemen are sometimes seized with sudden fits of admiration
for the young relatives of ladies whom they honor with their regard,
but this counterfeit philoprogenitiveness sits uneasily upon them,
and does not deceive anybody a particle.  Mr. Bhaer's devotion was
sincere, however likewise effective--for honesty is the best policy
in love as in law.  He was one of the men who are at home with chil-
dren, and looked particularly well when little faces made a pleasant
contrast with his manly one.  His business, whatever it was, detained
him from day to day, but evening seldom failed to bring him out to
see--well, he always asked for Mr. March, so I suppose he was the
attraction.  The excellent papa labored under the delusion that he
was, and reveled in long discussions with the kindred spirit, till
a chance remark of his more observing grandson suddenly enlightened
him.

     Mr. Bhaer came in one evening to pause on the threshold of the
study, astonished by the spectacle that met his eye.  Prone upon
the floor lay Mr. March, with his respectable legs in the air, and
beside him, likewise prone, was Demi, trying to imitate the atti-
tude with his own short, scarlet-stockinged legs, both grovelers
so seriously absorbed that they were unconscious of spectators,
till Mr. Bhaer laughed his sonorous laugh, and Jo cried out, with
a scandalized face . . .

     "Father, Father, here's the Professor!"

     Down went the black legs and up came the gray head, as the
preceptor said, with undisturbed dignity, "Good evening, Mr. Bhaer.
Excuse me for a moment.  We are just finishing our lesson.  Now,
Demi, make the letter and tell its name."

     "I knows him!" And, after a few convulsive efforts, the red
legs tok the shape of a pair of compasses, and the intelligent
pupil triumphantly shouted, "It's a We, Dranpa, it's a We!"

     "He's a born Weller," laughed Jo, as her parent gathered him-
self up, and her nephew tried to stand on his head, as the only
mode of expressing his satisfaction that school was over.

     "What have you been at today, bubchen?" asked Mr. Bhaer, pick-
ing up the gymnast.

     "Me went to see little Mary."

     "And what did you there?"

     "I kissed her," began Demi, with artless frankness.

     "Prut!  Thou beginnest early.  What did the little Mary say
to that?" asked Mr. Bhaer, continuing to confess the young sinner,
who stood upon the knee, exploring the waistcoat pocket.

     "Oh, she liked it, and she kissed me, and I liked it.  Don't
little boys like little girls?" asked Demi, with his mouth full,
and an air of bland satisfaction.

     "You precious chick!  Who put that into your head?" said Jo,
enjoying the innocent revelation as much as the Professor.

     "`Tisn't in mine head, it's in mine mouf," answered literal
Demi, putting out his tongue, with a chocolate drop on it, think-
ing she alluded to confectionery, not ideas.

     "Thou shouldst save some for the little friend.  Sweets to
the sweet, mannling." And Mr. Bhaer offered Jo some, with a look
that made her wonder if chocolate was not the nectar drunk by the
gods.  Demi also saw the smile, was impressed by it, and artlessy
inquired. ..

     "Do great boys like great girls, to, 'Fessor?"

     Like young Washington, Mr. Bhaer `couldn't tell a lie', so
he gave the somewhat vague reply that he believed they did some-
times,in a tone that made Mr. March put down his clothesbrush,
glance at Jo's retiring face, and then sink into his chair, look-
ing as if the `precocious chick' had put an idea into his head
that was both sweet and sour.

     Why Dodo, when she caught him in the china closet half an
hour afterward, nearly squeezed the breath out of his little body
with a tender embrace, instead of shaking him for being there,
and why she followed up this novel performance by the unexpected
gift of a big slice of bread and jelly, remained one of the prob-
lems over which Demi puzzled his small wits, and was forced to
leave unsolved forever.


                      CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

     While Laurie and Amy were taking conjugal strolls over velvet
carpets, as they set their house in order, and planned a blissful
future, Mr. Bhaer and Jo were enjoying promenades of a different
sort, along muddy roads and sodden fields.

     "I always do take a walk toward evening, and I don't know
why I should give it up, just because I happen to meet the Pro-
fessor on his way out," said Jo to herself, after two or three
encounters, for though there were two paths to Meg's whichever
one she took she was sure to meet him., either going or return-
ing.  He was always walking rapidly, and never seemed to see her
until quite close, when he would look as if his short-sighted
eyes had failed to recognize the approaching lady till that
moment.  Then, if she was going to Meg's he always had something
for the babies.  If her face was turned homeward, he had merely
strolled down to see the river, and was just returning, unless
they were tired of his frequent calls.

     Under the circumstances, what could Jo do but greet him
civilly, and invite him in?  If she was tired of his visits, she
concealed her weariness with perfect skill,and took care that
there should be coffee for supper, "as Friedrich--I mean Mr.
Bhaer--doesn't like tea."

     By the second week, everyone knew perfectly well what was
going on, yet everyone tried to look as if they were stone-blind
to the changes in Jo's face.  They never asked why she sang about
her work, did up her hair three times a day, and got so blooming
with her evening exercise.  And no one seemed to have the slight-
est suspicion that Professor Bhaer, while talking philosophy with
the father, was giving the daughter lessons in love.

     Jo couldn't even lose her heart in a decorous manner, but
sternly tried to quench her feelings, and failing to do so, led
a somewhat agitated life.  She was mortally afraid of being laughed
at for surrendering, after her many and vehement declarations of
independence.  Laurie was her especial dread, but thanks to the
new manager, he behaved with praiseworthy propriety, never called
Mr. Bhaer `a capital old fellow' in public, never alluded, in the
remotest manner, to Jo's improved appearance, or expressed the
least surprise at seeing the Professor's hat on the Marches' table
nearly every evening.  But he exulted in private and longed for
the time to come when he could give Jo a piece of plate, with a
bear and a ragged staff on it as an appropriate coat of arms.

     For a fortnight, the Professor came and went with lover-like
regularity.  Then he stayed away for three whole days, and made
no sign, a proceeding which caused everybody to look sober, and
Jo to become pensive, at first, and then--alas for romance--very
cross.

     "Disgusted, I dare say, and gone home as suddenly as he came.
It's nothing tome, of course, but I should think he would have
come and bid us goodbye like a gentleman," she said to herself,
with a despairing look at the gate, as she put on her things for
the customary walk one dull afternoon.

     "You'd better take the little umbrella, dear.  It looks like
rain," said her mother, observing that she had on her new bonnet,
but not alluding to the fact.

     "Yes, Marmee, do you want anything in town?  I've got to
run in and get some paper," returned Jo, pulling out the bow
under her chin before the glass as an excuse for not looking at
her mother.

     "Yes, I want some twilled silesia, a paper of number nine
needles, and two yards of narrow lavender ribbon.  Have you got
your thick boots on, and something warm under your cloak?"

     "I believe so," answered Jo absently.

     "If you happen to meet Mr. Bhaer, bring him home to tea.
I quite long to see the dear man," added Mrs. March.

     Jo heard that, but made no answer, except to kiss her mother,
and walk rapidly away, thinking with a glow of gratitude, in spite
of her heartache, "How good she is to me! What do girls do who
haven't any mothers to help them through their troubles?"

     The dry-goods stores were not down among the counting-houses,
banks, and wholesale warerooms, where gentlemen most do congregate,
but Jo found herself in that part of the city before she did a
single errand, loitering along as if waiting for someone, examin-
ing engineering instruments in one window and samples of wool in
another, with most unfeminine interest, tumbling over barrels,
being half-smothered by descending bales, and hustled unceremon-
iously by busy men who looked as if they wondered `how the deuce
she got there'.  A drop of rain on her cheek recalled her thoughts
from baffled hopes to ruined ribbons.  For the drops continued to
fall, and being a woman as well as a lover, she felt that, though
it was too late to save her heart, she might her bonnet.  Now she
remembered the little umbrella, which she had forgotten to take
in her hurry to be off, but regret was unavailing, and nothing
could be done but borrow one or submit to to a drenching.  She
looked up at the lowering sky, down at the crimson bow already
flecked with black, forward along the muddy street, then one
long, lingering look behind, at a certain grimy warehouse, with
`Hoffmann, Swartz, & Co.' over the door, and said to herself,
with a sternly reproachful air...

     "It serves me right! what business had I to put on all my
best things and come philandering down here, hoping to see the
Professor?  Jo, I'm ashamed of you!  No, you shall not go there
to borrow an umbrella, or find out where he is, from his friends.
You shall trudge away, and do your errands in the rain, and if
you catch your death and ruin your bonnet, it's no more than
you deserve.  Now then!"

     With that she rushed across the street so impetuously that
she narrowly escaped annihilation from a passing truck,and pre-
cipitated herself into the arms of a stately old gentleman, who
said, "I beg pardon, ma'am," and looked mortally offended.  Some-
what daunted, Jo righted herself, spread her handkerchief over
the devoted ribbons, and putting temptation behind her, hurried on,
with increasing dampness about the ankles, and much clashing of
umbrellas overhead.  The fact that a somewhat dilapidated blue
one remained stationary above the unprotected bonnet attracted
her attention, and looking up, she saw Mr. Bhaer looking down.

     "I feel to know the strong-minded lady who goes so bravely
under many horse noses, and so fast through much mus.  What do
you down here, my friend?"

     "I'm shopping."

     Mr. Bhaer smiled, as he glanced from the pickle factory on
one side to the wholesale hide and leather concern on the other,
but her only said politely, "You haf no umbrella.  May I go also,
and take for you the bundles?"

     "Yes, thank you."

     Jo's cheeks were as red as her ribbon, and she wondered what
he thought of her, but she didn't care, for in a minute she found
herself walking away arm in arm with her Professor, feeling as if
the sun had suddenly burst out with uncommon brilliancy, that
the world was all right again, and that one thoroughly happy woman
was paddling through the wet that day.

     "We thought you had gone," said Jo hastily, for she knew he
was looking at her.  Her bonnet wasn't big enough to hide her face,
and she feared he might think the joy it betrayed unmaidenly.

     "Did you believe that I should go with no farewell to those
who haf been so heavenly kind tome?" he asked so reproachfully
that she felt as if she had insulted him by the suggestion, and
answered heartily . . .

     "No, I didn't.  I knew you were busy about your own affairs,
but we rather missed you, Father and Mother especially."

     "And you?"

     "I'm always glad to see you, sir."

     In her anxiety to keep her voice quite calm, Jo made it rather
cool, and the frosty little monosyllable at the end seemed to chill
the Professor, for his smile vanished, as he said gravely . . .

     "I thank you, and come one more time before I go."

     "You are going, then?"

     "I haf no longer any business here, it is done."

     "Successfully, I hope?" said Jo, for the bitterness of dis-
appointment was in that short reply of his.

     "I ought to think so, for I haf a way opened to me by which
I can make my bread and gif my Junglings much help."

     "Tell me, please!  I like to know all about the--the boys,"
said Jo eagerly.

     "That is so kind, I gladly tell you.  My friends find for me
a place in a college, where I teach as at home, and earn enough
to make the way smooth for Franz and Emil.  For this I should be
grateful, should I not?"

     "Indeed you should.  How splendid it will be to have you
doing what you like, and be able to see you often, and the boys!"
cried Jo, clinging to the lads as an excuse for the satisfaction
she could not help betraying.

     "Ah!  But we shall not meet often, I fear, this place is at
the West."

     "So far away!" And Jo left her skirts to their fate, as if
it didn't matter now what became of her clothes or herself.

     Mr. Bhaer could read several languages, but he had not
learned to read women yet.  He flattered himself that he knew
Jo pretty well, and was, therefore, much amazed by the contra-
dictions of voice, face, and manner, which she showed him in
rapid succession that day, for she was in half a dozen different
moods in the course of half an hour.  When she met him she looked
surprised, though it was impossible to help suspecting that she
had come for that express purpose.  When he offered her his arm,
she took it with a look that filled him with delight, but when
he asked if she missed him, she gave such a chilly, formal reply
that despair fell upon him.  On learning his good fortune she
almost clapped her hands.  Was the joy all for the boys?  Then
on hearing his destination, she said, "So far away!" in a tone
of despair that lifted him on to a pinnacle of hope, but the
next minute she tumbled him down again by observing, like one
entirely absorbed in the matter...

     "Here's the place for my errands.  Will you come in? It
won't take long."

     Jo rather prided herself upon her shopping capabilities,
and particularly wished to impress her escort with the neat-
ness and dispatch with which she would accomplish the business.
But owing to the flutter she was in, everything went amiss.
She upset the tray of needles, forgot the silesia was to be
`twilled' till it was cut off, gave the wrong change, and
covered herself with confusion by asking for lavender ribbon
at the calico counter.  Mr. Bhaer stood by, watching her blush
and blunder, and as he watched, his own bewilderment seemed to
subside, for he was beginning to see that on some occasions,
women,like dreams, go by contraries.

     When they came out, he put the parcel under his arm with
a more cheerful aspect, and splashed through the puddles as if
he rather enjoyed it on the whole.

     "Should we no do a little what you call shopping for the
babies, and haf a farewell feast tonight if I go for my last
call at your so pleasant home?" he asked, stopping before a
window full of fruit and flowers.

     "What will we buy?" asked Jo, ignoring the latter part of
his speech, and sniffing the mingled odors with an affectation
of delight as they went in.

     "May they haf oranges and figs?" asked Mr. Bhaer, with a
paternal air.

     "They eat them when they can get them."

     "Do you care for nuts?"

     "Like a squirrel."

     "Hamburg grapes.  Yes, we shall drink to the Fatherland in
those?"

     Jo frowned upon that piece of extravagance, and asked why
he didn't buy a frail of dated, a cask of raisins, and a bag of
almonds, and be done with it?  Whereat Mr. Bhaer confiscated her
purse, produced his own, and finished the marketing by buying
several pounds of grapes, a pot of rosy daisies, and a pretty
jar of honey, to be regarded in the light of a demijohn.  Then
distorting his pockets with knobby bundles,and giving her the
flowers to hold, he put up the old umbrella, and they traveled
on again.

     "Miss Marsch, I haf a great favor to ask of you," began the
Professor, after a moist promenade of half a block.

     "Yes, sir." And Jo's heart began to beat so hard she was
afraid he would hear it.

     "I am bold to say it in spite of the rain, because so short
a time remains to me."

     "Yes, sir."  And Jo nearly crushed the small flowerpot with
the sudden squeeze she gave it.

     "I wish to get a little dress for my Tina, and I am too stupid
to go alone.  Will you kindly gif me a word of taste and help?"

     "Yes, sir." And JO felt as calm and cool all of a sudden as if
she had stepped into a refrigerator.

     "Perhaps also a shawl for Tina's mother, she is so poor and sick,
and the husband is such a care.  Yes, yes, a thick, warm shawl
would be a friendly thing to take the little mother."

     "I'll do it with pleasure, Mr. Bhaer.  I'm going very fast,
and he's getting dearer every minute," added Jo to herself, then
with a mental shake she entered into the business with an energy
that was pleasant to behold.

     Mr. Bhaer left it all to her, so she chose a pretty gown for
Tina, and then ordered out the shawls.  The clerk, being a married
man, condescended to take an interest in the couple, who appeared
to be shopping for their family.

     "Your lady may prefer this.  It's a superior article, a most
desirable color, quite chaste and genteel," he said, shaking out
a comfortable gray shawl, and throwing it over Jo's shoulders.

     "Does this suit you, Mr. Bhaer?" she asked, turning her
back to him, and feeling deeply grateful for the chance of hiding
her face.

     "Excellently well, we will haf it," answered the Professor,
smiling to himself as he paid for it, while Jo continued to
rummage the counters like a confirmed bargain-hunter.

     "Now shall we go home?" he asked, as if the words were
very pleasant to him.

     "Yes, it's late, and I'm so tired." Jo's voice was more
pathetic than she knew.  For now the sun seemed to have gone
in as suddenly as it came out, and the world grew muddy and
miserable again, and for the first time she discovered that her
feet were cold, her head ached, and that her heart was colder
than the former, fuller of pain than the latter.   Mr. Bhaer
was going away, he only cared for her as a friend, it was all
a mistake, and the sooner it was over the better.  With this
idea in her head, she hailed an approaching omnibus with such
a hasty gesture that the daisies flew out of the pot and were
badly damaged.

     "This is not our omniboos," said the Professor, waving the
loaded vehicle away, and stopping to pick up the poor little
flowers.

     "I beg your pardon.  I didn't see the name distinctly. Never
mind, I can walk.  I'm used to plodding in the mud," returned Jo,
winking hard, because she would have died rather than openly
wipe her eyes.
     MR. Bhaer saw the drops on her cheeks, though she turned her
head away.  The sight seemed to touch him very much, for suddenly
stooping down, he asked in a tone that meant a great deal, "Heart's
dearest, why do you cry?"

     Now, if Jo had not been new to this sort of thing she would
have said she wasn't crying, had a cold in her head, or told
any other feminine fib proper to the occasion.  Instead of which,
that undignified creature answered, with an irrepressible sob,
"Because you are going away."

     "Ach, mein Gott, that is so good!" cried Mr. Bhaer, managing
to clasp his hands in spite of the umbrella and the bundles, "Jo,
I haf nothing but much love to gif you.  I came to see if you
could care for it, and I waited to be sure that I was something
more than a friend.  Am I?  Can you make a little place in your
heart for old Fritz?" he added, all in one breath.

     "Oh, yes!" said Jo, and he was quite satisfied, for she
folded both hands over his are, and looked up at him with an
expression that plainly showed how happy she would be to walk
through life beside him, even though she had no better shelter
than the old umbrella, if he carried it.

     It was certainly proposing under difficulties, for even if
he had desired to do so, Mr. Bhaer could not go down upon his
knees, on account of the mud.  Neither could he offer Jo his
hand, except figuratively, for both were full.  Much less could
he indulge in tender remonstrations in the open street, though
he was near it.  So the only way in which he could express his
rapture was to look at her, with an expression which glorified
his face to such a degree that there actually seemed to be
little rainbows in the drops that sparkled on his beard.  If
he had not loved Jo very much, I don't think he could have done
it then, for she looked far from lovely, with her skirts in a
deplorable state, her rubber boots splashed to the ankle, and
her bonnet a ruin.  Fortunately, Mr. Bhaer considered her the
most beautiful woman living, and she found him more `Jove-like"
than ever, though his hatbrim was quite limp with the little
rills trickling thence upon his shoulders (for he held the
umbrella all over Jo), and every finger of his gloves needed
mending.

     Passers-by probably thought them a pair of harmless lun-
atics, for they entirely forgot to hail a bus, and strolled
leisurely along, oblivious of deepening dusk and fog.  Little
they cared what anybody thought, for they were enjoying the
happy hour that seldom comes but once in any life, the magi-
cal moment which bestows youth on the old, beauty on the plain,
wealth on the poor, and gives human hearts a foretaste of heaven.
The Professor looked as if he had conquered a kingdom, and the
world had nothing more to offer him in the way of bliss.  While
Jo trudged beside him, feeling as if her place had always been
there, and wondering how she ever could have chosen any other
lot.  Of course, she was the first to speak--intelligibly, I
mean, for the emotional remarks which followed her impetuous
"Oh, yes!" were not of a coherent or reportable character.

     "Friedrich, why didn't you . . ."

     "Ah, heaven, she gifs me the name that no one speaks since
Minna died!" cried the Professor, pausing in a puddle to regard
her with grateful delight.

     "I always call you so to myself--I forgot, but I won't unless
you like it."

     "Like it?  It is more sweet to me than I can tell.  Say `thou',
also, and I shall say your language is almost as beautiful as mine."

     "Isn't `thou' a little sentimental?" asked Jo, privately think-
ing it a lovely monosyllable.

     "Sentimental? Yes. Thank Gott, we Germans believe in sentiment,
and keep ourselves young mit it.  Your English `you' is so cold, say
`thou', heart's dearest, it means so much to me," pleaded Mr. Bhaer,
more like a romantic student than a grave professor.

     "Well, then, why didn't thou tell me all this sooner?" asked
Jo bashfully.

     "Now I shall haf to show thee all my heart, and I so gladly
will, because thou must take care of it hereafter.  See, then, my
Jo--ah, the dear, funny little name--I had a wish to tell some-
thing the day I said goodbye in New York, but I thought the hand-
some friend was betrothed to thee, and so I spoke not. Wouldst
thou have said `Yes', then, if I had spoken?"

     "I don't know.  I'm afraid not, for I didn't have any heart
just then."

     "Prut!  That I do not believe.  It was asleep till the fairy
prince came through the wood, and waked it up.  Ah, well, `Die
erste Liebe ist die beste', but that I should not expect."

     "Yes, the first love is the best, but be so contented, for I
never had another.  Teddy was only a boy, and soon got over his
little fancy," said Jo, anxious to correct the Professor's mis-
take.

    "Good!  Then I shall rest happy, and be sure that thou givest
me all.  I haf waited so long, I am grown selfish, as thou wilt
find , Professorin."

     "I like that," cried Jo, delighted with her new name. "Now
tell me what brought you, at last, just when I wanted you?"

     "This." And Mr. Bhaer took a little worn paper out of his
waistcoat pocket.

     Jo unfolded it, and looked much abashed, for it was one of
her own contributions to a paper that paid for poetry, which
accounted for her sending it an occasional attempt.

     "How could that bring you?" she asked, wondering what he
meant.

     "I found it by chance.  I knew it by the names and the
initials, and in it there was one little verse that seemed to
call me.  Read and find him.  I will see that you go not in
the wet."

                         IN THE GARRET

                 Four little chests all in a row,
                 Dim with dust, and worn by time,
                 All fashioned and filled, long ago,
                 By children now in their prime.
                 Four little keys hung side by side,
                 With faded ribbons, brave and gay
                 When fastened there, with childish pride,
                 Long ago, on a rainy day.
                 Four little names, one on each lid,
                 Carved out by a boyish hand,
                 And underneath there lieth hid
                 Histories of the happpy band
                 Once playing here, and pausing oft
                 To hear the sweet refrain,
                 That came and went on the roof aloft,
                 In the falling summer rain.

                 "Meg" on the first lid, smooth and fair.
                 I look in with loving eyes,
                 For folded here, with well-known care,
                 A goodly gathering lies,
                 The record of a peaceful life--
                 Gifts to gentle child and girl,
                 A bridal gown, lines to a wife,
                 A tiny shoe, a baby curl.
                 No toys in this first chest remain,
                 For all are carried away,
                 In their old age, to join again
                 In another small Meg's play.
                 Ah, happy mother!  Well I know
                 You hear, like a sweet refrain,
                 Lullabies ever soft and low
                 In the falling summer rain.

                 "Jo" on the next lid, scratched and worn,
                 And within a motley store
                 Of headless, dolls, of schoolbooks torn,
                 Birds and beasts that speak no more,
                 Spoils brought home from the fairy ground
                 Only trod by youthful feet,
                 Dreams of a future never found,
                 Memories of a past still sweet,
                 Half-writ poems, stories wild,
                 April letters, warm and cold,
                 Diaries of a wilful child,
                 Hints of a woman early old,
                 A woman in a lonely home,
                 Hearing, like a sad refrain--
                 "Be worthy, love, and love will come,"
                 In the falling summer rain.

                 My Beth!  the dust is always swept
                 From the lid that bears your name,
                 As if by loving eyes that wept,
                 By careful hands that often came.
                 Death cannonized for us one saint,
                 Ever less human than divine,
                 And still we lay, with tender plaint,
                 Relics in this household shrine--
                 The silver bell, so seldom rung,
                 The little cap which last she wore,
                 The fair, dead Catherine that hung
                 By angels borne above her door.
                 The songs she sang, without lament,
                 In her prison-house of pain,
                 Forever are they sweetly blent
                 With the falling summer rain.

                 Upon the last lid's polished field--
                 Legend now both fair and true
                 A gallant knight bears on his shield,
                 "Amy" in letters gold and blue.
                 Within lie snoods that bound her hair,
                 Slippers that have danced their last,
                 Faded flowers laid by with care,
                 Fans whose airy toils are past,
                 Gay valentines, all ardent flames,
                 Trifles that have borne their part
                 In girlish hopes and fears and shames,
                 The record of a maiden heart
                 Now learning fairer, truer spells,
                 Hearing, like a blithe refrain,
                 The silver sound of bridal bells
                 In the falling summer rain.

                 Four little chests all in a row,
                 Dim with dust, and worn by time,
                 Four women, taught by weal and woe
                 To love and labor in their prime.
                 Four sisters, parted for an hour,
                 None lost, one only gone before,
                 Made by love's immortal power,
                 Nearest and dearest evermore.
                 Oh, when these hidden stores of ours
                 Lie open to the Father's sight,
                 May they be rich in golden hours,
                 Deeds that show fairer for the light,
                 Lives whose brave music long shall ring,
                 Like a spirit-stirring strain,
                 Souls that shall gladly soar and sing
                 In the long sunshine after rain.

     "It's very bad poetry, but I felt it when I wrote it, one day
when I was very lonely, and had a good cry on a rag bag.  I never
thought it would go where it could tell tales," said Jo, tearing
up the verses the Professor had treasured so long.

     "Let it go, it has done it's duty, and I will haf a fresh one
when I read all the brown book in which she keeps her little
secrets," said Mr. Bhaer with a smile as he watched the fragments
fly away on the wind.  "Yes," he added earnestly, "I read that,
and I think to myself, She has a sorrow, she is lonely, she would
find comfort in true love.  I haf a heart full, full for her. Shall
I not go and say, "If this is not too poor a thing to gif for what
I shall hope to receive, take it in Gott's name?"

     "And so you came to find that it was not too poor,but the one
precious thing I needed," whispered Jo.

     "I had no courage to think that at first, heavenly kind as was
your welcome to me.  But soon I began to hope, and then I said, `I
will haf her if I die for it'. and so I will!" cried Mr. Bhaer,
with a defiant nod, as if the walls of mist closing round them were
barriers which he was to surmount or valiantly knock down.

     Jo thought that was splendid, and resolved to be worthy of her
knight, though he did not come prancing on a charger in gorgeous
array.

     "What made you stay away so long?" she asked presently, finding
it so pleasant to ask confidential questions and get delightful
answers that she could not keep silent.

     "It was not easy, but I could not find the heart to take you
from that so happy home until I could haf a prospect of one to
gif you, after much time, perhaps, and hard work.  How could I ask
you to gif up so much for a poor old fellow, who has no fortune
but a little learning?"

     "I'm glad you are poor.  I couldn't bear a rich husband,"
said Jo decidedly, adding in a softer tone, "Don't fear poverty.
I've known it long enough to lose my dread and be happy working
for those I love, and don't call yourself old--forty is the prime
of life.  I couldn't help loving you if you were seventy!"

     The Professor found that so touching that he would have been
glad of his handkerchief, if he could have got at it.  As her
couldn't, Jo wiped his eyes for him, and said, laughing, as she
took away a bundle or two...

     "I may be strong-minded, but no one can say I'm out of my
sphere now, for woman's special mission is supposed to be drying
tears and bearing burdens.  I'm to carry my share, Friedrich,
and help to earn the home.  Make up your mind to that, or I'll
never go," she added resolutely, as he tried to reclaim his load.

     "We shall see.  Haf you patience to wait a long time, Jo?
I must go away and do my work alone.  I must help my boys first,
because, even for you, I may not break my word to Minna.  Can
you forgif that, and be happy while we hope and wait?"

     "Yes, I know I can, for we love one another, and that makes
all the rest easy to bear.  I have my duty, also, and my work.
I couldn't enjoy myself if I neglected them even for you, so
there's no need of hurry or impatience.  You can do your part
out West, I can do mine here, and both be happy hoping for the
best, and leaving the future to be as God wills."

     "Ah! Thou gifest me such hope and courage, and I haf nothing
to gif back but a full heart and these empty hands," cried the
Professor, quite overcome.

     Jo never, never would learn to be proper, for when he said
that as they stood upon the steps, she just put both hands into
his, whispering tenderly,  "Not empty now," and stooping down,
kissed her Friedrich under the umbrella.  It was dreadful, but
she would have done it if the flock of draggle-tailed sparrows
on the hedge had been human beings, for she was very far gone
indeed, and quite regardless of everything but her own happiness.
Though it came in such a very simple guise, that was the crowning
moment of both their lives, when, turning from the night and
storm and loneliness to the household light and warmth and peace
waiting to receive them, with a glad "Welcome home!"  Jo led her
lover in, and shut the door.


                    CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

     For a year Jo and her Professor worked and waited, hoped
and loved, met occasionally, and wrote such voluminous letters
that the rise in the price of paper was accounted for, Laurie
said.  The second year began rather soberly, for their pros-
pects did not brighten, and Aunt March died suddenly.  But
when their first sorrow was over--for they loved the old lady
in spite of her sharp tongue--they found they had cause for
rejoicing, for she had left Plumfield to Jo, which made all
sorts of joyful things possible.

     "It's a fine old place, and will bring a handsome sum, for
of course you intend to sell it," said Laurie, as they were all
talking the matter over some weeks later.

     "No, I don't," was Jo's decided answer, as she petted the
fat poodle, whom she had adopted, out of respect to his former
mistress.

     "You don't mean to live there?"

     "Yes, I do."

     "But, my dear girl, it's an immense house, and will take a
power of money to keep it in order.  The garden and orchard alone
need two or three men, and farming isn't in Bhaer's line, I take
it."

     "He'll try his hand at it there, if I propose it."

     "And you expect to live on the produce of the place?  Well,
that sounds paradisiacal, but you'll find it desperate hard work."

     "The crop we are going to raise is a profitable one," And
Jo laughed.

     "Of what is this fine crop to consist, ma'am?"

     "Boys.  I want to open a school for little lads--a good,
happy, homelike school, with me to take care of them and Fritz
to teach them."

     "That's a truly Joian plan for you!  Isn't that just like
her?" cried Laurie, appealing to the family, who looked as much
surprised as he.

     "I like it," said Mrs. March decidedly.

     "So do I," added her husband, who welcomed the thought of
a chance for trying the Socratic method of education on modern
youth.

     "It will be an immense care for Jo," said Meg, stroking
the head or her one all-absorbing son.

     "Jo can do it, and be happy in it.  It's a splendid idea.
Tell us all about it," cried Mr. Laurence, who had been longing
to lend the lovers a hand, but knew that they would refuse his
help.

     "I knew you'd stand by me, sir.  Amy does too--I see it in
her eyes, though she prudently waits to turn it over in her mind
before she speaks.  Now, my dear people," continued Jo earnestly,
"just understand that this isn't a new idea of mine, but a long-
cherished plan.  Before my Fritz came, I used to think how, when
I'd made my fortune, and no one needed me at home, I'd hire a
big house, and pick up some poor, forlorn little lads who hadn't
any mothers, and take care of them, and make life jolly for them
before it was too late.  I see so many going to ruin for want of
help at the right minute, I love so to do anything for them, I
seem to feel their wants, and sympathize with their troubles, and
oh, I should so like to be a mother to them!"

     Mrs. March held out her hand to Jo, who took it, smiling,
with tears in her eyes, and went on in the old enthusiastic way,
which they had not seen for a long while.

     "I told my plan to Fritz once, and he said it was just what
he would like, and agreed to try it when we got rich.  Bless his
dear heart, he's been doing it all his life--helping poor boys, I
mean, not getting rich, that he'll never be.  Money doesn't stay
in his pocket long enough to lay up any.  But now, thanks to my
good old aunt, who loved me better than I ever deserved, I'm rich,
at least I feel so, and we can live at Plumfield perfectly well,
if we have a flourishing school.  It's just the place for boys,
the house is big, and the furniture strong and plain.  There's
plenty of room for dozens inside, and splendid grounds outside.
They could help in the garden and orchard.  Such work is healthy,
isn't it, sir?  Then Fritz could train and teach in his own way,
and Father will help him.  I can feed and nurse and pet and scold
them, and Mother will be my stand-by.  I've always longed for lots
of boys, and never had enough, now I can fill the house full and
revel in the little dears to my heart's content.  Think what lux-
ury--Plumfield my own, and a wilderness of boys to enjoy it with
me."

     As Jo waved her hands and gave a sigh of rapture, the family
went off into a gale of merriment, and Mr. Laurence laughed till
they thought he'd have an apoplectic fit.

     "I don't see anything funny," she said gravely, when she
could be heard.  "Nothing could be more natural and proper than
for my Professor to open a school, and for me to prefer to reside
in my own estate."

     "She is putting on airs already," said Laurie, who regarded
the idea in the light of a capital joke.  "But may I inquire how
you intend to support the establishment? If all the pupils are
little ragamuffins, I'm afraid your crop won't be profitable in
a worldly sense, Mr. Bhaer."

     "Now don't be a wet-blanket, Teddy. Of course I shall have
rich pupils, also--perhaps begin with such altogether.  Then,
when I've got a start, I can take in a ragamuffin or two, just
for a relish.  Rich people's children often need care and comfort,
as well as poor.  I've seen unfortunate little creatures left to
servants, or backward ones pushed forward, when it's real cruelty.
Some are naughty through mismanagment or neglect, and some lose
their mothers.  Besides, the best have to get through the hobble-
dehoy age, and that's the very time they need most patience and
kindness.  People laugh at them, and hustle them about, try to
keep them out of sight, and expect them to turn all at once from
pretty children into fine young men.  They don't complain much--
plucky little souls--but they feel it.  I've been through some-
thing of it, and I know all about it.  I've a special interest
in such young bears, and like to show them that I see the warm,
honest, well-meaning boys' hearts, in spite of the clumsy arms
and legs and the topsy-turvy heads.  I've had experience, too,
for haven't I brought up one boy to be a pride and honor to his
family?"

     "I'll testify that you tried to do it," said Laurie with a
grateful look.

     "And I've succeeded beyond my hopes, for here you are, a
steady, sensible businessman, doing heaps of good with your
money, and laying up the blessings of the poor, instead of dollars.
But you are not merely a businessman, you love good and beautiful
things, enjoy them yourself, and let others go halves, as you
always did in the old times.  I am proud of you, Teddy, for you
get better every year, and everyone feels it, though you won't
let them say so.  Yes, and when I have my flock, I'll just point
to you, and say `There's your model, my lads'."

     Poor Laurie didn't know where to look, for, man though he
was, something of the old bashfulness came over him as this burst
of praise made all faces turn approvingly upon him.

     "I say, Jo, that's rather too much," he began, just in his
old boyish way.  "You have all done more for me than I can ever
thank you for, except by doing my best not to disapoint you. You
have rather cast me off lately, Jo, but I've had the best of help,
nevertheless.  So, if I've got on at all, you may thank these two
for it."  And he laid one hand gently on his grandfather's head,
and the other on Amy's golden one, for the three were never far
apart.

     "I do think that families are the most beautiful things in
all the world!" burst out Jo, who was in an unusually up-lifted
frame of mind just then.  "When I have one of my own, I hope it
will be as happy as the three I know and love the best.  If John
and my Fritz were only here, it would be quite a little heaven
on earth," she added more quietly.  And that night when she went
to her room after a blissful evening of family counsels, hopes,
and plans, her heart was so full of happiness that she could only
calm it by kneeling beside the empty bed always near her own, and
thinking tender thoughts of Beth.

     It was a very astonishing year altogether, for things seemed
to happen in an unusually rapid and delightful manner.  Almost
before she knew where she was, Jo found herself married and set-
tled at Plumfield.  Then a family of six or seven boys sprung up
like mushrooms, and flourished surprisingly, poor boys as well as
rich, for Mr. Laurence was continually finding some touching case
of destitution, and begging the Bhaers to take pity on the child,
and he would gladly pay a trifle for its support.  In this way,
the sly old gentleman got round proud Jo, and furnished her with
the style of boy in which she most delighted.

     Of course it was uphill work at first, and Jo made queer
mistakes, but the wise Professor steered her safely into calmer
waters, and the most rampant ragamuffin was conquered in the end.
How Jo did enjoy her `wilderness of boys', and how poor, dear
Aunt March would have lamented had she been there to see the
sacred precincts of prim, well-ordered Plumfield overrun with
Toms, Dicks, and Harrys!  There was a sort of poetic justice
about it, after all, for the old lady had been the terror of
the boys for miles around, and now the exiles feasted freely
on forbidden plums, kicked up the gravel with profane boots un-
reproved, and played cricket in the big field where the irritable
`cow with a crumpled horn' used to invite rash youths to come and
be tossed.  It became a sort of boys' paradise, and Laurie sug-
gested that it should be called the `Bhaer-garten', as a compli-
ment to its master and appropriate to its inhabitants.

     It never was a fashionable school, and the Professor did not
lay up a fortune, but it was just what Jo intended it to be--`a
happy, homelike place for boys, who needed teaching, care, and
kindness'.  Every room in the big house was soon full.  Every
little plot in the garden soon had its owner.  A regular mena-
gerie appeared in barn and shed, for pet animals were allowed.
And three times a day, Jo smiled at her Fritz from the head of
a long table lined on either side with rows of happy young faces,
which all turned to her with affectionate eyes, confiding words,
and grateful hearts, full of love for `Mother Bhaer'.  She had
boys enough now, and did not tire of them, though they were not
angels, by any means, and some of them caused both Professor and
Professorin much trouble and anxiety.  But her faith in the good
spot which exists in the heart of the naughtiest, sauciest, most
tantalizing little ragamuffin gave her patience, skill, and in
time success, for no mortal boy could hold out long with Father
Bhaer shining on him as benevolently as the sun, and Mother Bhaer
forgiving him seventy times seven.  Very precious to Jo was the
friendship of the lads, their penitent sniffs and whispers after
wrongdoing, their droll or touching little confidences, their
pleasant enthusiasms, hopes, and plans, even their misfortunes,
for they only endeared them to her all the more.  There were slow
boys and bashful boys, feeble boys and riotous boys, boys that
lisped and boys that stuttered, one or two lame ones, and a
merry little quadroon, who could not be taken in elsewhere, but
who was welcome to the `Bhaer-garten', though some people pre-
dicted that his admission would ruin the school.

     Yes, Jo was a very happy woman there, in spite of hard work,
much anxiety, and a perpetual racket. She enjoyed it heartily and
found the applause of her boys more satisfying than any praise of
the world, for now she told no stories except to her flock of
enthusiastic believers and admirers.  As the years went on, two
little lads of her own came to increase her happiness--Rob,
named for Grandpa, and Teddy, a happy-go-lucky baby, who seemed
to have inherited his papa's sunshiny temper as well as his
mother's lively spirit.  How they ever grew up alive in that
whirlpool of boys was a mystery to their grandma and aunts, but
they flourished like dandelions in spring, and their rough
nurses loved and served them well.

     There were a great many holidays at Plumfield, and one of
the most delightful was the yearly apple-picking. For then the
Marches, Laurences, Brookes. And Bhaers turned out in full force
and made a day of it. Five years after Jo's wedding, one of these
fruitful festivals occurred, a mellow October day, when the air
was full of an exhilarating freshness which made the spirits rise
and the blood dance healthily in the veins.  The old orchard wore
its holiday attire.  Goldenrod and asters fringed the mossy walls.
Grasshoppers skipped briskly in the sere grass, and crickets chir-
ped like fairy pipers at a feast.  Squirrels were busy with their
small harvesting.  Birds twittered their adieux from the alders
in the lane, and every tree stood ready to send down its shower
of red or yellow apples at the first shake.  Everybody was there.
Everybody laughed and sang, climbed up and tumbled down. Every-
body declared that there never had been such a perfect day or
such a jolly set to enjoy it, and everyone gave themselves up to
the simple pleasures of the hour as freely as if there were no
such things as care or sorrow in the world.

     Mr. March strolled placidly about, quoting Tusser, Cowley,
and Columella to Mr. Laurence, while enjoying . . .

                The gentle apple's winey juice.

The Professor charged up and down the green aisles like a stout
Teutonic knight, with a pole for a lance, leading on the boys,
who made a hook and ladder company of themselves, and performed
wonders in the way of ground and lofty tumbling.  Laurie devoted
himself to the little ones, rode his small daughter in a bushel-
basket, took Daisy up among the bird's nests, and kept adventur-
ous Rob from breaking his neck.  Mrs. March and Meg sat among
the apple piles like a pair of Pomonas, sorting the contributions
that kept pouring in, while Amy with a beautiful motherly express-
ion in her face sketched the various groups, and watched over one
pale lad, who sat adoring her with his little crutch beside him.

     Jo was in her element that day, and rushed about, with her
gown pinned up, and her hat anywhere but on her head, and her
baby tucked under her arm, ready for any lively adventure which
might turn up.  Little Teddy bore a charmed life, for nothing
ever happened to him, and Jo never felt any anxiety when he was
whisked up into a tree by one lad, galloped off on the back of
another, or supplied with sour russets by his indulgent papa,
who labored under the Germanic delusion that babies could digest
anything, from pickled cabbage to buttons, nails, and their own
small shoes.  She knew that little Ted would turn up again in
time, safe and rosy, dirty and serene, and she always received
him back with a hearty welcome, for Jo loved her babies tenderly.

     At four o'clock a lull took place, and baskets remained
empty, while the apple pickers rested and compared rents and
bruises.  Then Jo and Meg, with a detachment of the bigger boys,
set forth the supper on the grass, for an out-of-door tea was
always the crowning joy of the day.  The land literally flowed
with milk and honey on such occasions, for the lads were not
required to sit at table, but allowed to partake of refreshment
as they liked--freedom being the sauce best beloved by the boy-
ish soul.  They availed themselves of the rare privilege to the
fullest extent, for some tried the pleasing experiment of drink-
ing mild while standing on their heads, others lent a charm to
leapfrog by eating pie in the pauses of the game, cookies were
sown broadcast over the field, and apple turnovers roosted in
the trees like a new style of bird.  The little girls had a
private tea party, and Ted roved among the edibles at his own
sweet will.

     When no one could eat any more, the Professor proposed the
first regular toast, which was always drunk at such times--"Aunt
March, God bless her!"  A toast heartily given by the good man,
who never forgot how much he owed her, and quietly drunk by the
boys, who had been taught to keep her memory green.

     "Now, Grandma's sixtieth birthday!  Long life to her, with
three times three!"

     That was given with a will, as you may well believe, and
the cheering once begun, it was hard to stop it.  Everybody's
health was proposed, form Mr. Laurence, who was considered their
special patron, to the astonished guinea pig, who had strayed
from its proper sphere in search of its young master.  Demi, as
the oldest grandchild, then presented the queen of the day with
various gifts, so numerous that they were transported to the
festive scene in a wheelbarrow. Funny presents, some of them,
but what would have been defects to other eyes were ornaments
to Grandma's--for the children's gifts were all their own. Every
stitch Daisy's patient little fingers had put into the handker-
chiefs she hemmed was better than embroidery to Mrs. March. Demi's
miracle of mechanical skill, though the cover wouldn't shut, Rob's
footstool had a wiggle in its uneven legs that she declared was
soothing, and no page of the costly book Amy's child gave her was
so fair as that on which appeared in tipsy capitals, the words--
"To dear Grandma, from her little Beth."

     During the ceremony the boys had mysteriously disappeared,
and when Mrs. March had tried to thank her children, and broken
down, while Teddy wiped her eyes on his pinafore, the Professor
suddenly began to sing.  Then, from above him, voice after voice
took up the words, and from tree to tree echoed the music of the
unseen choir, as the boys sang with all their hearts the little
song that Jo had written, Laurie set to music, and the Professor
trained his lads to give with the best effect.  This was some-
thing altogether new, and it proved a grand success, for Mrs.
March couldn't get over her surprise, and insisted on shaking
hands with every one of the featherless birds, from tall Franz
and Emil to the little quadroon, who had the sweetest voice of
all.

     After this, the boys dispersed for a final lark, leaving Mrs.
March and her daughters under the festival tree.

     "I don't think I ever ought to call myself `unlucky Jo' again,
when my greatest wish has been so beautifully gratified," said Mrs.
Bhaer, taking Teddy's little fist out of the milk pitcher, in which
he was rapturously churning.

     "And yet your life is very different from the one you pictured
so long ago.  Do you remember our castles in the air?" asked Amy,
smiling as she watched Laurie and John playing cricket with the
boys.

     "Dear fellows!  It does my heart good to see them forget bus-
iness and frolic for a day," answered Jo, who now spoke in a maternal
way of all mankind.  "Yes, I remember, but the life I wanted then
seems selfish, lonely, and cold to me now.  I haven't given up the
hope that I may write a good book yet, but I can wait, and I'm
sure it will be all the better for such experiences and illustra-
tions as these."  And Jo pointed from the lively lads in the
distance to her father, leaning on the Professor's arm, as they
walked to and fro in the sunshine, deep in one of the conversations
which both enjoyed so much, and then to her mother, sitting en-
throned among her daughters, with their children in her lap and at
her feet, as if all found help and happiness in the face which
never could grow old to them.

     "My castle was the most nearly realized of all.  I asked for
splendid things, to be sure, but in my heart I knew I should be
satisfied, if I had a little home, and John, and some dear chil-
dren like these.  I've got them all, thank God, and am the
happiest woman in the world."  And Meg laid her hand on her tall
boy's head, with a face full of tender and devout content.

     "My castle is very different from what I planned, but I would
not alter it, though, like Jo, I don't relinquish all my artistic
hopes, or confine myself to helping others fulfill their dreams of
beauty.  I've begun to model a figure of baby, and Laurie says it
is the best thing I've ever done.  I think so, myself, and mean
to do it in marble, so that, whatever happens, I may at least keep
the image of my little angel."

     As Amy spoke, a great tear dropped on the golden hair of the
sleeping child in her arms, for her one well-beloved daughter was
a frail little creature and the dread of losing her was the shad-
ow over Amy's sunshine.  This cross was doing much for both father
and mother, for one love and sorrow bound them closely together.
Amy's nature was growing sweeter, deeper, and more tender.  Laurie
was growing more serious, strong, and firm, and both were learning
that beauty, youth, good fortune, even love itself, cannot keep
care and pain, loss and sorrow, from the most blessed for ...

              Into each life some rain must fall,
              Some days must be dark and sad and dreary.

     "She is growing better, I am sure of it, my dear.  Don't
despond, but hope and keep happy,"  said Mrs. March, as tender-
hearted Daisy stooped from her knee to lay her rosy cheek against
her little cousin's pale one.

     "I never ought to, while I have you to cheer me up, Marmee,
and Laurie to take more than half of every burden," replied Amy
warmly.  "He never lets me see his anxiety, but is so sweet and
patient with me, so devoted to Beth, and such a stay and comfort
to me always that I can't love him enough.  So, in spite of my
one cross, I can say with Meg, `Thank God, I'm a happy woman.'"

     "There's no need for me to say it, for everyone can see
that I'm far happier than I deserve," added Jo, glancing from
her good husband to her chubby children, tumbling on the grass
beside her.  "Fritz is getting gray and stout.  I'm growing as
thin as a shadow, and am thirty.  We never shall be rich, and
Plumfield may burn up any night, for that incorrigible Tommy
Bangs will smoke sweet-fern cigars under the bed-clothes,
though he's set himself afire three times already.  But in
spite of these unromantic facts, I have nothing to complain
of, and never was so jolly in my life.  Excuse the remark, but
living among boys, I can't help using their expressions now
and then."

     "Yes, Jo, I think your harvest will be a good one," began
Mrs. March, frightening away a big black cricket that was
staring Teddy out of countenance.

     "Not half so good as yours, Mother.  Here it is, and we
never can thank you enough for the patient sowing and reaping
you have done," cried Jo, with the loving impetuosity which
she never would outgrow.

     "I hope there will be more wheat and fewer tares every
year," said Amy softly.

     "A large sheaf, but I know there's room in your heart for
it, Marmee dear," added Meg's tender voice.

     Touched to the heart, Mrs. March could only stretch out
her arms, as if to gather children and grandchildren to herself,
and say, with face and voice full of motherly love, gratitude,
and humility...

     "Oh, my girls, however long you may live, I never can
wish you a greater happiness than this!"

                    END OF LITTLE WOMEN