THE May of 1880 was long remembered as the hottest spring month in many years. Not a drop of rain fell between April and June, and for weeks the sun poured down upon the city streets, with almost the scorching heat of July. Many people left town earlier than usual, and the ferries and the near-by beaches were thronged with tourists, in search of a cool breeze. But in the Winslow house things went on much as usual. For years it had been Mrs. Winslow’s custom to remain in town until June fifteenth, on which date she moved her household to the old family homestead on the Hudson, there to remain for precisely three months, and she was not a person to be turned from a custom of years by a little hot weather.

How the children longed for Lizzie, and the trips to Central Park. The daily walk in Washington Square seemed very tame and uninteresting in comparison, and on some afternoons the heat there was almost unbearable. But they were not allowed to venture farther from home, and without car-fare the trip to Central Park was an impossibility. Lessons became a daily drudgery, which even Dulcie dreaded, and Miss Hammond was so tired and nervous, after a long winter’s work, that she was not much better able to teach than her pupils were to study.

Daisy, who was not very strong, suffered more than the others, and became so pale and languid that even Grandma noticed it, and administered a most disagreeable tonic three times a day, which made the approach of meal-times a veritable nightmare to the child. The tonic helped Daisy’s appetite, but did not cure the headaches, and the little girl spent more than one hot afternoon lying on the nursery sofa, while Dulcie or Molly sponged her forehead with cold water drawn from the tap in the bath-room.

It was a broiling Sunday afternoon, towards the end of the month, and Daisy was just recovering from one of those distressing headaches. The others had all gone to afternoon service, with Grandma and Aunt Kate, but she had been excused, because she had grown so white and faint during the morning service that Grandma had been obliged to send her out of church before the sermon, with Molly to look after her, and take her home. But a long nap on the sofa, with her head swathed in a wet towel, had cured the headache, and as the clock struck four she awoke to the realization that she was feeling much better.

“I believe I’ll go and see Miss Polly,” she decided, after a little reflection. “We haven’t any of us been for more than a week, and if I try to read my head may get bad again.”

So she rose from the sofa, and having removed the wet towel, and smoothed her hair, started for her call. But just outside the nursery door she paused, and her face brightened.

“I’ll run down to the yard first, and pick her a bunch of syringa,” she said to herself. “The bush is all out, and Grandma will never notice if I take a little. Miss Polly loves flowers.”

Accordingly, instead of going to the trunk-room, she ran down the three flights of stairs to the dining-room, and out through the open French window, to the little balcony, from which a flight of steps descended to the back yard. It was a large sunny yard, and in old Dr. Winslow’s time had been quite a garden, but Grandma did not take much interest in flowers, and there was little of the garden left, except a syringa-bush and a few rose-bushes, which seldom bloomed until after the family had gone away for the summer. It was Mary’s Sunday out, but Bridget was entertaining visitors in the kitchen. Daisy could hear their voices, as she hastily plucked a small bunch of the fragrant flowers. She dared not take many, lest Grandma should notice, and ask awkward questions. She was just turning back to the steps, when her ear caught some words uttered by one of Bridget’s visitors.

“She’s awful bad,” the woman was saying; “I don’t believe she’ll last the summer through. It’s a terrible pity, for a sweeter, kinder little thing never lived in this world, and as to her patience, stayin’ all day long, with never a soul to speak to, it just makes you ashamed to complain about anything yourself.”

Daisy stood still, and her heart gave a sudden throb. Could they be talking of Miss Polly? She remembered that Bridget and Mary knew some of the servants in the boarding-house next door.

“Ain’t she got nobody belongin’ to her?” Bridget asked, sympathetically.

“She’s got a brother somewhere, but I guess he don’t care much about her. He never comes to see her, anyhow. If Miss Collins was at home I wouldn’t worry, but she’s gone off to take care of her sick sister in Virginia, and Mrs. Brown, who’s looking after the house while she’s away, don’t take no more interest in poor little Miss Polly than if she wasn’t there at all. Why, the poor thing don’t eat enough to keep a canary alive, and she’s gettin’ paler and thinner before your eyes.”

“I suppose you wouldn’t dare have a doctor to see her, would you, Maggie?” put in another voice.

What Maggie answered Daisy did not wait to hear. She had heard enough already, and her heart was very heavy, as she mounted the steps, with her precious flowers. Until that moment she had not realized how much she had grown to love Miss Polly.

“She mustn’t die, oh, she mustn’t!” thought the little girl, winking back the rising tears. “Oh, if she would only write to her brother, and tell him all about everything!” And she thought of the kind, handsome face in the photograph on Miss Polly’s bureau.

But by the time she reached her friend’s door, she had succeeded in controlling the desire to cry, although her voice had not quite its usual cheerful sound. Miss Polly seldom came to the door now, and this afternoon she was not even in her wheel-chair, but lying upon her bed, reading her Bible. But her greeting was as hearty as ever, and she buried her face in the bunch of syringa, with a little cry of delight.

“Oh, my dear,” she said, joyfully, “you don’t know what a pleasure you have brought me. It is so odd; I was dreaming last night of my old home in Vermont, and I could see the syringa-bush that grew by the parsonage gate. It was all so real that when I woke it seemed as if I must have really been there. Would you mind putting these in water for me? There’s an extra glass on the wash-stand. I can’t bear to have them fade, and if you stand the glass on the little table beside my bed, I can look at them and smell them all the evening. I am afraid I have been very lazy to-day. It was so warm this morning, and I felt so tired, that I thought I would just lie in bed for a while, and later it seemed hardly worth while getting up for such a few hours. It’s Maggie’s day out, too, and I don’t like to trouble her more than I can help. Oh, how nicely you have arranged the flowers! Now come and sit down, and tell me all about what you have been doing lately.”

Daisy complied, but as she talked, telling of the little every-day happenings, it seemed as if her heart grew heavier and heavier. How thin Miss Polly’s hands were, and there surely did not used to be those great hollows in her cheeks. Try as she might, she could not always keep the quiver out of her voice. Miss Polly’s quick ear did not fail to notice the fact.

“What is it, dearie?” she asked gently, laying a soft little hand on Daisy’s. “Is something troubling you? Don’t you feel well to-day?”

“Not very,” Daisy admitted, glad of this excuse; “I’ve had a headache all day. I had to go out of church before the sermon, and Grandma didn’t like it. I think she was afraid I pretended my head was worse than it was, but I didn’t really.”

“I am sure you didn’t,” said Miss Polly, smiling, “although I have heard of ‘Sunday headaches’ before. My brother Tom used to have them when he was a boy, and Father finally cured him by insisting that if he were not able to go to church, he must go to bed, and stay there for the rest of the day. It proved quite a wonderful cure.”

Daisy laughed, but in a moment she was grave again.

“I wish Grandma would believe us,” she said. “We don’t tell stories, but she thinks we do, and it makes Dulcie so angry. We try to remember that she’s an old lady, and that we are only her step-grandchildren, anyway, but it is a little hard sometimes, especially when we know she doesn’t like having us stay with her. Paul heard his mother say we were an incumbrance. Dulcie looked up that word in the dictionary, and it means the same thing as being a burden.”

Involuntarily Miss Polly’s thin fingers closed more tightly over the little hand she was holding.

“How soon is your father coming home?” she asked abruptly.

Daisy’s face brightened.

“Oh, we are very happy about that,” she said; “we think he may come this summer. He hasn’t promised, but in his last letter he said we might see him sooner than we expected, and we expected him next winter, anyway.”

“That is good news indeed,” said Miss Polly, heartily, “although I suppose it will mean that I shall lose my little neighbors. By the way, won’t you be leaving town for the summer before long?”

“Not till the fifteenth of June,” said Daisy. “Grandma says that makes a long enough summer for her. She doesn’t enjoy the country as much as we do.”

Miss Polly sighed, and glanced lovingly at her bunch of syringa.

“The country must be very beautiful just now,” she said a little wistfully. “Tom wrote me the lilac-bush in his garden was in full bloom. I should love to see blooming flowers again.”

“If you wheel your chair into the back room you can see our syringa-bush,” suggested Daisy. “Next month there will be some roses, too, but of course a back yard isn’t like the real country. Do you love the country very much, Miss Polly?”

“Oh, my dear, I love it more than words can express. I lie here thinking of it these warm days, and almost every night I dream of my little room at home. There used to be a robin’s nest in the tree just outside my window. I hope the people who live in the parsonage now keep the lily bed weeded; Father was so proud of that bed.”

“Your brother lives in the country, doesn’t he?” Daisy asked, rather timidly.

“Yes, right on the shore of Lake Michigan. It is only half an hour by train from Chicago, but Tom says the country is lovely. I have been writing to Tom to-day, and I think it was the hardest letter I have ever had to write, because I was obliged to say something that I knew would cause him pain.”

“Oh, Miss Polly, why?” cried tender-hearted Daisy. “He’s so fond of you. Did you really have to make him unhappy?”

“I am afraid so, dear, and the thought is very hard to bear. I had a letter from him yesterday, such a dear, kind letter.”

“Does he want you to come and make him a visit?” inquired Daisy, in a tone of breathless interest.

Miss Polly nodded.

“He and Helen want me to come and spend the summer. This is Tom’s fourth letter on the subject, and I have had two from Helen besides. I have had to make such foolish, shallow excuses, and now I am afraid Tom will be hurt, and think I don’t care to come to them.”

Miss Polly broke off abruptly, and hastily brushed away a tear. It was the first tear Daisy had ever seen the cheerful little invalid shed.

“Oh, dear Miss Polly,” she pleaded, “please, please don’t be unhappy. Why do you keep on not telling, when you know your brother loves you so much? Don’t send that horrid letter. Write another one, and tell him you’ll come. If you’re too tired to write, I’ll write for you, and you can tell me what to say. Oh, Miss Polly dear, please, please!”

But for once Miss Polly did not heed her little neighbor. She had buried her face in the pillow, and was sobbing as if her heart would break.

“It’s all my pride, my foolish, wicked pride,” she moaned. “I can’t bear to be a burden. I cannot bear to have Tom know how I have failed. He didn’t want me to come to New York by myself. We almost quarrelled about it. And all these years I have been deceiving him—letting him think I had succeeded in my plans—oh, my dear, my dear, I have done very wrong, and now I am ashamed to confess the truth.”

The tears of sympathy were streaming down Daisy’s own cheeks, but at these last words of Miss Polly’s she could not refrain from a little gasp of astonishment.

“But you haven’t failed,” she cried, eagerly. “Oh, how could you possibly think you had? You’re the most beautiful Christian we ever knew, and when your brother knows all about it, he’ll be so proud of you he won’t know what to do. We were talking about you yesterday, and Dulcie said she wished she could do something like that, just to make Papa proud of her. Oh, Miss Polly, please don’t cry any more; it makes me cry too, and I’m afraid it’ll bring my headache on again.”

“No, no, dear, I won’t,” and Miss Polly made a hasty search for her handkerchief. “I am a foolish little woman to say I know, but I haven’t been feeling very well lately, and I suppose things bother me more than they would otherwise. Now we are not going to talk any more about unpleasant things. I want to hear about Paul. Have you had a letter from him lately?”

Daisy stayed for another half-hour, and Miss Polly did her best to seem cheerful, and to take an interest in all she was told, but it was easy to see the effort was a painful one, and at last the little girl rose to go, fearing she had stayed too long already. Miss Polly seemed very tired, and, contrary to her custom, did not urge her visitor to stay longer.

“Will you do something for me, dear?” she said, as Daisy bent to kiss her good-bye. “I want to get my letter to Tom posted this evening, and I am afraid it will be too late when Maggie comes home. I didn’t finish writing until after she went out. It’s right here on the table, all stamped and ready to go. Would it be too much trouble to take it to the letter-box at the corner?”

“Of course it wouldn’t be too much trouble,” said Daisy, “only—only——” A warning glance from Miss Polly checked the impetuous words of protest, and with another kiss, she hurried away, in her hand the letter that was to carry to Tom Oliver the news that his sister “preferred spending the summer in New York.”

Daisy did not take the letter at once to the post-box on the corner. On the contrary, she carried it back to the nursery, and there laid it down on the desk, where she continued to stare at it for several minutes. She was very pale, but there was a bright, excited expression in her eyes, and her hands twitched nervously. Suddenly she went over to the bed she shared with Dulcie, and dropping down on her knees beside it, closed her eyes, and folded her hands.

“Oh, dear God,” she whispered, “please forgive me if what I am going to do is very dreadful. I can’t let poor Miss Polly go on being so unhappy; I am afraid she may die, and then her brother will feel so terribly to think he never knew about how brave and wonderful she’s been. Please tell me if I ought to write the letter, and don’t let Miss Polly be very angry with me when she knows. Amen.”

For a few moments the room was very still. Then Daisy rose, and there was a look of settled determination on her face.

“I think God wants me to do it,” she said, unconsciously speaking out loud. “I feel as if He was telling me I ought to do it.” And, without further hesitation, she seated herself at the desk, and having selected a sheet of paper, began to write. This is what she wrote:

Daisy’s heart was beating very fast, as she slipped her letter into an envelope, and copied the address from the other letter on the desk. She dared not read over what she had written, for fear of losing courage. It was such a terribly bold, unheard-of thing that she had done, and yet—Maggie had said Miss Polly might not live through the summer. She must get the letter posted quickly, before she had time to change her mind.

Having addressed and stamped her envelope, she took the two letters, and without even waiting to get her hat, she flew down-stairs, and out into the street. It was only a few steps to the corner where the letter-box was, and in less than five minutes from the time she left the nursery both letters had taken the first step on their journey to Chicago.

When the others returned, half an hour later, they found Daisy lying on the sofa, with her head buried in the cushions.

“Why, Daisy,” exclaimed Dulcie, bending over her sister in real anxiety, “what is it? Is your head worse?”

“It isn’t my head,” Daisy answered, lifting a swollen, tear-stained face from the sofa pillows; “it’s—it’s—oh, girls, I’ve done the most dreadful thing, and I’m so frightened I don’t know what I shall do!”