tea-time. I was goin' by, and I thought I'd jest look in a minute; that was all. It wa'n't anything. Good-evenin'." She was half down the walk before she finished speaking. She never looked around. The lawyer turned to Mrs. Field. "Mrs. Henry Maxwell was not any too much pleased to see you sitting here," he whispered, with a confidential smile. "She wouldn't say anything; she's as proud as Lucifer; but she was considerably taken aback." Mrs. Field nodded. She felt numb. She had not understood who this other woman was. She knew now-the mother of the young woman who was the rightful heir to Thomas Maxwell's property. "The old lady has been pretty anxious," Mr. Tuxbury went on. "She's been in here a good many times-made excuses to come in and see if I had any news. She has been twice as much concerned as her daughter about it. Well, she has had a pretty hard time. That branch of the family lost a good deal of property." Mrs. Field rose abruptly. "I guess I'd better be goin'," said she. "It must be your tea-time. I'll come in again tomorrow." The lawyer put up his hand deprecatingly. "Mrs. Maxwell, you will of course stay and take tea with us, and remain with us to-night." "I'm jest as much obliged to you for invitin' me, but I guess I'd better be goin'." "My sister is expecting you. You remember my sister, Mrs. Lowe. I've just sent word to her. You had better come right over to the house with me now, and to-morrow morning we can attend to business. You must be fatigued with your journey." "I'm real sorry if your sister's put her self out, but I guess I'd better not stay." The lawyer turned his ear interrogatively. "I beg your pardon, but I didn't quite understand. You think you can't stay?" “I'm-much obliged to your sister an' you for invitin' me, but I guess I'd bet ter-not." "Why-but-Mrs. Maxwell! Just be seated again for a moment, and let me speak to my sister; perhaps she-" "I'm jest as much obliged to her, but I feel as if I'd better be goin'." Mrs. Field stood before him, mildly unyielding. She seemed to waver toward his will, but all the time she abided toughly in her own self like a willow bough. "But, Mrs. Maxwell, what can you do?" said the lawyer, his manner full of perplexity, and impatience thinly veiled by courtesy. "The hotel here is not very desirable, and—” "Can't I go right up to-the house?" "The Maxwell house?" "Yes, sir; if there ain't anything to hinder. Mr. Tuxbury stared at her. "Why, I don't know that there is really anything to hinder," he said, slowly. "Although it is rather- No, I don't know as there is any actual objection to your going. I suppose the house belongs to you. it is shut up. I think you would find it much pleasanter here, Mrs. Maxwell." His eyebrows were raised, his mouth pursed up. But "I guess I'd better gc, if I can jest as well as not; if I can get into the house." Mrs. Field spoke with deprecating persistency. Mr. Tuxbury turned abruptly toward his desk, and began fumbling in a drawer. She stood hesitatingly watchful. "If you would jest tell me where I'd find the key," she ventured to remark. She had a vague idea that she would be told to look under a parlor blind for the key, that being the innocent country hiding-place when the house was left alone. "I have the key, and I will go to the house with you myself directly." "I hate to make you so much trouble. I guess I could find it myself, if-” "I will be ready immediately, Mrs. Maxwell," said the lawyer, in a smoothly conclusive voice which abashed her. She stood silently by the door until he was ready. He took her black bag peremptorily, and they went side by side down the street. He held his head well back, his lips were still tightly pursed, and he swung his cane with asperity. His important and irascible nature was oddly disturbed by this awkwardly obstinate old woman stalking at his side in her black clothes. Feminine opposition, even in slight matters, was wont to aggravate him, but in no such degree as this. He found it hard to recover his usual courtesy of manner, and indeed scarcely spoke a word during the walk. He could not himself understand his discomposure. But Mrs. Field did not seem to notice. She walked on, with her stern, impassive old face set straight ahead. Once they met a young girl who made her think of Lois; her floating draperies brushed against her black gown, for a second there was a pale, innocent little face looking up into her own. It was not a very long walk to the Maxwell house. "Here we are," said the lawyer, coldly, and unlatched a gate, and held it open with stiff courtesy for his companion to pass. They proceeded in silence up the long curve of walk which led to the front door. The walk was brown and slippery with pine needles. Tall old pine-trees stood in groups about the yard. There were also elm and horse-chestnut trees. The horse-chestnuts were in blossom, holding up their white bouquets, which showed dimly. It was now quite dusky. Back of the trees the house loomed up. It was white and bulky, with fluted cornices and corner posts, and a pillared porch to the front door. Mrs. Field passed between the two outstanding pillars, which reared themselves whitely over her, like ghostly sentries, and stood waiting while Mr. Tuxbury fitted the key to the lock. It took quite a little time; he could not see very well, he had forgotten his spectacles in his impatient departure. But at last he jerked open the door, and a strange conglomerate odor, the very breath of the life of the old Maxwell house, steamed out in their faces. All bridal and funeral feasts, all daily food, all garments which had hung in the closets and rustled through the rooms, every piece of furniture, every carpet and hanging, had a part in it. The rank and bitter emanations of life, as well as spices and sweet herbs and delicate perfumes, went to make up the breath which smote one in the face upon the opening of the door. Still it was not a disagreeable, but rather a suggestive and poetical odor, which should affect one like a reminiscent dream. However, the village people sniffed at it, and said, "How musty that old house is!" That was what Daniel Tuxbury said now. The house is musty," he remarked, with stately nose in the air. Mrs. Field made no response. She stepped inside at once. "I'm much obliged to you," said she. The lawyer looked at her, then past her into the dark depths of the house. "You can't see," said he. "You must let me Mr. Tuxbury stepped forward with decision, and began fumbling in his pocket for a match. "Of course you cannot find one in the dark, Mrs. Maxwell," said he, with open exasperation. She said nothing more, but stood meekly in the hall until a light flared out from a room on the left. The lawyer had found a lamp, he was himself somewhat familiar with the surroundings, but on the way to it he stumbled over a chair with an exclamation. sounded like an oath to Mrs. Field, but she thought she must be mistaken. had never in her life heard many oaths, and when she did had never been able to believe her ears. It She "I hope you didn't hurt you," said she, deprecatingly, stepping forward. "I am not hurt, thank you." But the twinge in the lawyer's ankle was confirming his resolution to say nothing more to her on the subject of his regret and unwillingness that she should choose to refuse his hospitality, and spend such a lonely and uncomfortable night. "I won't say another word to her about it," he declared to himself. So he simply made arrangements with her for a meeting at his office the next morning to attend to the business for which there had been no time to-night, and took his leave. "I never saw such a woman,' was his conclusion of the story which he related to his sister upon his return home. His sister was a widow, and just then her married daughter and two children were visiting her. "I wish you'd let me know she wa'n't comin'," said she. "I cut the fruit cake an' opened a jar of peach, an' I've put clean sheets on the front chamber bed. It's made considerable work for nothin'." She eyed, as she spoke, the two children, who were happily eating the peach preserve. She and her brother were both quite well-to-do, but she had a parsimonious turn. "I'd like to know what she'll have for supper," she remarked further. "I didn't ask her," said the lawyer, dryly, taking a sip of his sauce. He was rather glad of the peach himself. "I shouldn't think she'd sleep a wink, all alone in that great old house. I know I shouldn't," observed the children's mother. She was a fair, fleshy, quite pretty young woman. "That woman would sleep on a tombstone if she set out to," said the lawyer. His speech, when alone with his own household, was more forcible and not so well regulated. Indeed, he did not come of a polished family; he was the only educated one among them. His sister, Mrs. Lowe, regarded him with all the deference and respect which her own decided and self-sufficient character could admit of, and often sounded his praises in her unrestrained New England dialect. She seemed like a real set kind of a woman, then?" said she now. 66 piece of furniture for which she knew no name, an evidence of long-established wealth and old-fashioned luxury, of which she and her plain folk, with their secretaries and desks and bureaus, had known nothing. The clock had stopped at three o'clock. Mrs. Field thought to herself that it might have been the hour on which old Mr. Maxwell died, reflecting that souls were more apt to pass away in the nave of the night. She would have liked to wind the clock, and set the hands moving past that ghostly hour, but she did not dare to stir. She gazed at the large dull figures sprawling over the old carpet, at the glimmering satiny scrolls on the wall-paper. On the mantel-shelf stood a branching gilt candlestick, filled with colored candles, and strung around "Set is no name for it," replied her with prisms, which glittered feebly in the brother. "Well, if that's so, I guess old Mr. Maxwell wa'n't so far wrong when he didn't have her down here before," she remarked, with a judicial air. Her spectacles glittered, and her harsh, florid face bent severely over the sugar-bowl and the cups and saucers. The lamp-light was mellow in the neat, homely dining-room, and there was a soft aroma of boiling tea all about. The pink and white children ate their peach sauce in happy silence, with their pretty eyes upon the prospective cake. "I suppose there must be some bed made up in all that big house," remarked their mother; "but it must be awful lonesome." Of the awful lonesomeness of it truly, this smiling, comfortable young soul had no conception. At that moment, while they were drinking their tea and talking her over, Jane Field sat bolt-upright in one of the old flag-bottomed chairs in the Maxwell sitting-room. She had dropped into it when the lawyer closed the door after him, and she never stirred afterward. She sat there all night. The oil was low in the lamp which the lawyer had lighted, and left standing on the table between the windows. She could see distinctly for a while the stately pieces of old furniture standing in their places against the walls. Just opposite where she sat was one of lustreless old mahogany, extending the width of the wall between two doors, rearing itself upon slender legs, set with multitudinous drawers, and surmounted by a clock. A low lamp-light. There was a bulging sheet-iron wood stove-the Maxwells had always eschewed coal; beside it lay a little pile of sticks, brought in after the chill of death had come over the house. There were a few old engravings -a head of Washington, the Landing of the Pilgrims, the Webster death - bed scene, and one full-length portrait of the old statesman, standing majestically, scroll in hand, in a black frame. As the oil burned low, the indistinct figures upon the carpet and wall-paper grew more indistinct, the brilliant colors of the prisms turned white, and the fine black and white lights in the death-bed picture ran together. Finally the lamp went out. Mrs. Field had spied matches over on the shelf, but she did not dare to rise to cross the room to get them and find another lamp. She did not dare to stir. After her light went out, there was still a pale glimmer upon the opposite wall, and the white face of the silent clock showed out above the cumbersome shadow of the great mahogany piece. The glimmer came from a neighbor's lamp shining through a gap in the trees. that also went out, and the old woman sat there in total darkness. Soon She folded her hands primly, and held up her bonneted head in the darkness, like some decorous and formal caller who might expect at any moment to hear the soft, heavy step of the host upon the creaking stair and his voice in the room. She sat there so all night. Gradually this steady-headed, unima ginative old woman became possessed by a legion of morbid fancies, which played like wildfire over the terrible main fact of the case-the fact which underlay everything that she had sinned, that she had gone over from good to evil, and given up her soul for a handful of gold. Many a time in the night, voices which her straining fancy threw out, after the manner of ventriloquism, from her own brain, seemed actually to vibrate through the house, footsteps pattered, and garments rustled. Often the phantom noises would swell to a very pandemonium surging upon her ears; but she sat there rigid and resolute in the midst of it, her pale old face sharpening out into the darkness. She sat there, and never stirred until morning broke. When it was fairly light, she got up, took off her bonnet and shawl, and found her way into the kitchen. She washed her face and hands at the sink, and went deliberately to work getting herself some breakfast. She had a little of her yesterday's lunch left; she kindled a fire, and made a cup of tea. She found some in a caddy in the pantry. She set out her meal on the table, and drew a chair before it. She had wound up the kitchen clock, and she listened to its tick while she ate. She took time, and finished her slight repast to the last crumb. Then she washed the dishes, and swept and tidied the kitchen. When that was done it was still too early for her to go to the lawyer's office. She sat down at an open kitchen window and folded her hands. Outside was a broad green yard, enclosed on two sides by the Maxwell house and barn. A driveway led to the barn, and on the farther side a row of apple-trees stood. There was a fresh wind blowing, and the apple blossoms were floating about. The drive was quite white with them in places, and they were half impaled upon the sharp green blades of grass. Over through the trees Mrs. Field could see the white top of a market wagon in a neighboring yard, and the pink dress of a woman who stood beside it trading. She watched them with a dull wonder. What had she now to do with market wagons and daily meals and housewifely matters? That fair-haired woman in the pink dress seemed to her like a woman of another planet. She was could not consciously moralize. At ten o'clock she put on her bonnet and shawl, and set out for the lawyer's office. She locked the front door, put the key under a blind, and proceeded down the front walk into the street. son. The spring was earlier here than in Green River. She started at a dancing net-work of leaf shadows on the sidewalk. They were the first she had seen this seaThere was a dewy arch of trees overhead, and they were quite fully leaved out. Mr. Tuxbury was in his office when she got there. He rose promptly and greeted her, and pushed forward the leather easy-chair with his old courtly flourish. "I suppose that old stick of a woman will be in pretty soon," he had remarked to his sister at breakfast-time. Well, you'll keep on the right side of her, if you know which side your bread is buttered," she retorted. "You don't want her goin' to Sam Totten's." Totten was the other lawyer of Elliot. "I think I am quite aware of all the exigencies of the case," Daniel Tuxbury had replied, lapsing into stateliness, as he always did when his sister waxed too forcible in her advice. But when Mrs. Field entered his office, every trace of his last night's impatience had vanished. He inquired genially if she had passed a comfortable night, and on being assured that she had, pressed her to drink a cup of coffee which he had requested his sister to keep warm. This declined with her countrified courtesy, so shy that it seemed grim, he proceeded, with no chill upon his graciousness, to business. Through the next two hours Mrs. Field sat at the lawyer's desk, and listened to a minute and wearisome description of her new possessions. She listened with very little understanding. She did not feel any interest in it. She never opened her mouth except now and then for a stiff assent to a question from the lawyer. A little after twelve o'clock he leaned This narrow-lived old country woman back in his chair with a conclusive sigh, "No, sir." Mrs. Field said it with a gasping readiness to speak one truth. "Let me see, what was her name?" asked the lawyer. "No; wait a moment; I'll tell you. I've heard it." He held up a hand as if warding off an answer from her, his face became furrowed with reflective wrinkles. "Field!" cried he, suddenly, with a jerk, and beamed at her. "I thought I could remember it," said he. "Yes, your sister's name was Field. When did she die, Mrs. Maxwell?" "Two years ago." There was a strange little smothered exclamation from some one near the office door. Mrs. Field turned suddenly, and saw her daughter Lois standing there. [TO BE CONTINUED.] EVERAL of our notable as well as notorious human, social, and civic customs find their prehistoric prototypes in the insect kingdom. The narchical institution sees its singular prophecy in the domestic economy of the bees. War and slavery have always been carried on systematically and effectually by ants, and, according to Huber and other au thorities, agriculture, gardening, and an industry very like dairy farming have been time-honored customs among this same wise and thrifty insect tribe, whose claims to thoughtful consideration were so long ago voiced by Solomon of proverbial fame. Thévenot mentions "Solomon's ant" as among the "beasts which shall enter paradise." Indeed, the human saint as well as sluggard may "go to the ant" for many suggestive hints and commentaries. These are only a few of the more notable parallelisms which suggest themselves. But others are not wanting if we care to follow the subject. In addition to the |