In the afternoon they all went to church , and at least two hearts were truly and devoutly thankful that day . When the dusk came , Ernest and Maxwell had to catch the last train for town , and the other guests went home , with the exception of Bertha , who was to stay all night . Just as soon as her resignation could be effected , she was to join her brother . `` Meanwhile , I 'll see about getting a house to put you in , '' said Max . `` No more boarding out for me , Ernest . You may consider me as a family man henceforth . '' Frances and Alma talked it all over before they went to sleep that night . `` Just think , '' said Frances , `` if we had n't asked her here today she might never have found her brother ! It 's all Mother 's doing , bless her ! Things do happen like a storybook sometimes , do n't they , Al ? A Correspondence and A Climax At sunset Sidney hurried to her room to take off the soiled and faded cotton dress she had worn while milking . She had milked eight cows and pumped water for the milk-cans afterward in the fag-end of a hot summer day . She did that every night , but tonight she had hurried more than usual because she wanted to get her letter written before the early farm bedtime . She had been thinking it out while she milked the cows in the stuffy little pen behind the barn . This monthly letter was the only pleasure and stimulant in her life . Existence would have been , so Sidney thought , a dreary , unbearable blank without it . She cast aside her milking-dress with a thrill of distaste that tingled to her rosy fingertips . As she slipped into her blue-print afternoon dress her aunt called to her from below . Sidney ran out to the dark little entry and leaned over the stair railing . Below in the kitchen there was a hubbub of laughing , crying , quarrelling children , and a reek of bad tobacco smoke drifted up to the girl 's disgusted nostrils .
Aunt Jane was standing at the foot of the stairs with a lamp in one hand and a year-old baby clinging XXXXX the other .
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