sleep is one of the most delightful and undervalued amusements known to the human race. i have never had enough yet, and every second of time that i'm not busy with something interesting, i curl up on the bed and go dream-hunting—only i sleep too hard to do much catching. but this torture book found that out about me, and stopped it the very first thing on page three. the command is to sleep as little as possible to keep the nerves in a good condition—"eight hours at the most, and seven would be better." what earthly good would a seven-hour nap do me? i want ten hours to sleep and twelve if i get a good tired start. to see me stagger out of my perfectly nice bed at six o'clock every morning now would wring the sternest heart with compassion and admiration at my faithfulness—to whom?

yes, it was the day after poor mr. carter's funeral that aunt adeline moved up here into my house and settled herself in the big south room across the landing from mine. her furniture weighs a ton each piece, and aunt adeline is not light herself in disposition. the next morning, when i went in to breakfast she sat in the "vacant chair" in a way that made me see that she was obviously trying to fill the vacancy. i am sorry she worried herself about that. anyhow, it made me take a resolve. after breakfast, i went into the kitchen to speak to jane.

"jane," i said, looking past her head, "my health is not very good, and you can bring my breakfast to me in bed after this." poor mr. carter always wanted breakfast on the stroke of seven. jane has buried husbands. also her mother is our washerwoman, and influenced by aunt adeline. jane understands everything i say to her. after i had closed the door i heard a laugh that sounded like a war-whoop, and i smiled to myself. but that was before my martyrdom to this book had begun. i get up now!

but the day after i came from london i lay in bed just as long as i wanted to, and ignored the thought of the exercises and deep breathing and the icy unsympathetic tub. i couldn't even take very much interest in the lonely egg on the lonely slice of dry toast. i was thinking about things.

hillsboro is a very peculiar little speck on the universe; even more peculiar than being like a hen. it is one of the oldest towns in the north, and the moss on it is so thick that it can't be scratched off except in spots. but when it does get stirred up to take an interest in anything, it certainly goes the pace. it hasn't had any real excitement for a long time, and i felt that it needed it. i rolled over and laughed into my pillow.

the subject of the conduct of widows is a serious one. of all the things old tradition is most set about, it is that; and what was decided to be the proper thing a million years ago this town still dictates shall be done, and spends a good deal of its time seeing its directions carried out.

for a year after the funeral they forget about the poor bereaved, and when they do remember her they speak to and of her in the same tones of voice they used at the obsequies. then sooner or later some neighbour is sure to see some man walk home from church with her, or hear some masculine voice in her front garden. mr. blake gave mrs. caruther's little jessie a ride in his trap and helped her out at her mother's gate just before last christmas, and if the poor widow hadn't acted quickly the town would have noticed them to death before he proposed to her. they were married the day after new year's day, and she lost lots of good friends because she didn't give them more time to talk about it.

i don't intend to run any risk of losing my friends that way, and i want them to have all the enjoyment they can get out of it. i'm going to serve out doses of excitement until the dear old place is running as it did when it was a two-year old. why get annoyed when people are interested in you? it's a compliment, after all, and gives them more to think about. i remembered the two trunks i had brought home with me, and hugged my knees up under my chin with pleasure at the thought of the town-talk they contained.

then just as i had got the first plan well going and was deciding whether to wear the mauve crêpe de chine or the white chiffon with the rosebud embroidery as a first dose for my friends, a sweetness came in through my window that took my breath away, and i lay still with my hand over my heart and listened. it was billy singing right under my window, and i've never heard him do it before in all his five years. it was the dearest old-fashioned tune ever written, and billy sang the words as distinctly as if he had been a boy chorister doing a difficult recitative. my heart beat so it shook the lace on my breast, like a breeze from heaven, as he took the high note and then let it go on the last few words.

"if you love me, molly, darling,

let your answer be a kiss!"

a confused recollection of having heard the words and tune sung by my mother when i was at the rocking age myself brought the tears to my eyes as i flew to the window and parted the curtains. if you heard a little boy-angel singing at your casement, wouldn't you expect a cherub face upturned with heaven-lights all over it? billy's face was upturned as he heard me draw up the blind, but it was streaked like a wild indian's with decorations of brown mud, and he held a slimy frog in one hand while he wiped his other grimy hand down the front of his linen blouse.

"i say, molly, look at the frog i bringed you!" he exclaimed as he came close under the sill, which is not high from the ground. "if you put your face down to the mud and sing something to 'em, they'll come out of their holes. a beetle comed, too, but i couldn't ketch 'em both. lift me up, and i can put him in the waterglass on your table." he held up one muddy hand to me, and promptly i lifted him up into my arms. from the embrace in which he and the frog and i indulged my lace and cambric came out much the worse.

"that was a lovely song you sang about 'molly darling,' billy," i said. "where did you hear it?"

"that's a good frog-song, molly, and i believe i can git a squirrel with it, too, if i sing it quite low." he began to squirm out of my arms toward the table and the glass.

"who taught it to you, sugar-sweet?" i persisted as i poured water in on the frog under his direction.

"nobody taught it to me. father sings it to me when tilly, nurse, nor you aren't there to put me to bed. he don't know no good songs like 'black-eyed susan' or 'little boy blue.' i go to sleep quick 'cause he makes me feel tired with his slow tune what's only good for frogs and things. get a piece of cloth to tie over the top of the glass, molly, quick!"

i found some, and i don't know why my hand trembled as i handed it to billy. as soon as he got it he climbed out of the window, glass, frog and all, and i saw him and the old setter go down the garden walk together in pursuit of the desired squirrel, i suppose. i closed the blinds and drew the curtains again and flung myself on my pillow. something warm and sweet seemed to be sweeping over me in great waves, and i felt young and close up to some sort of big world-good. it was delicious, and i don't know how long i would have stayed there just feeling it if jane hadn't brought in my letter.

he had written from london, and it was many pages of wonderful things all flavoured with me. he told me about miss clinton and what good friends they were, and how much he hoped she would be in hillsboro when he got here. he said that a great many of her dainty ways reminded him of his "own slip of a girl," especially the turn of her head like a "flower on its stem." at that i got right out of bed like a jack jumping out of a box and looked at myself in the mirror.

there is one exercise here on page twenty that i hate worst of all. you screw up your face tight until you look like a christmas mask to get your neck muscles taut, and then wobble your head round like a new-born baby until it swims. i did that one twenty extra times and all the others in proportion to make up for those two hours in bed. hereafter i'll get up at the time directed on page three, or maybe earlier. it frightens me to think that i've got only a few weeks more to turn from a cabbage-rose into a lily. i won't let myself even think "perfect flower" and "scarlet runner." if i do, i get warm and happy all over. i try when i get hungry to think of myself in that blue muslin dress.

i haven't been really willing before to write down in this wretched volume that i took that garment to the city with me and what madame rene did to it—remade it into the loveliest thing i ever saw, only i wouldn't let her alter the size one single inch. i'm honourable, as all women are at peculiar times. i think she understood, but she seemed not to, and worked a miracle on it with ribbon and lace. i've put it away on the top shelf of a cupboard, for it is a torment to look at it.

you can just take any recipe for a party and it will make a good début for a girl, but it takes more time to concoct one for a widow, especially if it is for yourself. i spent all the rest of the day doing almost nothing and thinking until i felt light-headed. finally i had just about given up any idea of a party and had decided to leak out in general society as quietly as my clothes would let me, when a real conflagration was lighted inside me.

if tom pollard wasn't my own first cousin i would have loved him desperately, even if i am a week older than he. he was about the only oasis in my childhood's days, though i don't think anybody would think of calling him at all green. he never stopped coming to see me occasionally, and mr. carter liked him. he was the first man to notice the white ruche i sewed in the neck of my old black silk four or five months ago, and he let me see that he noticed it out of the corner of his eyes as we were coming out of church, under aunt adeline's very elbow.

and when that conflagration was lighted in me about my début, tom did it. i was sitting peaceably in my own summer-house, dressed in the summer-before-last that jane washes and irons every day while i am deciding how to hand out the first sip of my trousseau to the neighbours, when tom, in a dangerous blue-striped shirt, with a tie that melted into it in tone, jumped over my fence and landed at my side. he kissed the lace ruffle on my sleeve while i reproved him severely and settled down to enjoy him. but i didn't have such a good time as i generally do with him. he was too full of another woman, and even a first cousin can be an exasperation in that condition.

"now, mrs. molly, truly did you ever see such a flower as she is?" he demanded after i had expressed more than a dozen delighted opinions of miss clinton. his use of the word "flower" riled me, and before i stopped to think, i said, "she reminds me more of a scarlet runner."

"now, molly, don't be jealous just because old wade has taken her out driving behind the greys after kissing your hand under the lilacs yesterday, which, fortunately, nobody saw but little me! i'm not sore, why should you be? aren't you happy with me?"

i withered him with a look, or rather tried to wither him, for tom is no mimosa bud.

"the way that girl has managed to wake up this little old town is a marvel," he continued enthusiastically. "let's don't let the folks know that they are off until i get everybody in a full swing of buzz over my queen." i had never seen tom so enthusiastic over a girl before, and i didn't like it. but i decided not to let him know that, but to get to work putting out the clinton blaze in him and starting one on my own account.

"that's just what i'm thinking about, tom," i said with a smile that was as sweet as i could make it, "and as she came with messages to me from one of my best old friends i think i ought to do something to make her have a good time. i was just planning a gorgeous dinner-party i want to have for her when you came so suddenly. do you think we could arrange it for tuesday evening?"

"good gracious, molly, don't knock the town down like that! let 'em have more than a week to get used to this white rag of a dress you've been waving in their faces for the last few days. go slow!"

"i've been going so slow for so many years that i've turned round and i'm going fast backward," i said with a blush that i couldn't help.

"help! let my kinship protect me!" exclaimed tom in alarm, and he pretended to move an inch away from me.

"yes," i said slowly, and as i looked out of the corner of my eyes from under the lashes that tom himself had once told me were "too long and black to be tidy," i saw that he was in a condition to get the full shock. "if anybody wakes up this town it will be i," i said as i flung down the gauntlet with a high head.

"here, molly, here are the keys of my office, and the spark-plug to the car; you can cut off a lock of my hair, and if jane has got a cake i'll eat it out of your hands. shall it be switzerland or japan? and i prefer my bride served in light grey tweed." tom really is delightful. then we both laughed and began to plan what tom called a conflagration. but i kept that delicious rose-embroidered treasure all to myself. i wanted him to meet it entirely unprepared.

i was glad we had both got over our excitement and were sitting decorously drinking tea, when the judge drew the greys up to the gate, and we both went out to the kerb to ask him and the lovely long lady to come in. they couldn't; but we stood and talked to them long enough for mrs. johnson to get a good look at us from across the street, and i was afraid i should find aunt adeline in a faint when i went into the house.

miss clinton was delightfully gracious about the dinner—i almost called it the début dinner—and the expression on the judge's face when he accepted! i was glad she was sitting beside him and couldn't see. some women like to make other women unhappy, but i think it is best for you to keep them blissfully unconscious until you get what you want. anyhow, i like that girl all over, and i can't see that her neck is so absolutely impossibly flowery. however, i think she might have been a little more considerate about discussing alfred's triumph over the italian mission. as a punishment i let tom take my arm as we stood watching them drive off, and then was sorry for the left grey horse that shied and came in for a crack of the judge's irritated whip.

then i refused to let tom come inside the gate, and he went down the street whistling, only when he got to the purple lilac he turned and kissed his hand to me. that, mrs. johnson just couldn't stand, and she came across the street immediately and called me back to the gate.

"you are tempting providence, molly carter," she exclaimed decidedly. "don't you know tom pollard is nothing but a scatter-brained fly-away? as a husband there'd be no dependence on him. besides being your cousin, he's younger than you. what do you mean?"

"he's just a week younger, mrs. johnson, and i wouldn't tie him for worlds, even if i married him," i said meekly. somehow i like mrs. johnson enough to be meek with her, and it always brings her to a higher point of excitement.

"tie, nonsense; marrying is roping in with ball and chain, to my mind. and a week between a man and a woman in their cradles gets to be fifteen years between them and their graves. well, i must go home now to see that sally cooks up a few of mr. johnson's crotchets for supper." and she began to hurry away.

marriage is the only worm in the bud of mrs. johnson's life, and her laugh has a snap to it even if it is not very sugary sweet.

when i told jane about the dinner-party and asked her to get her mother to come and help her, and her nephew to wait at table, she smiled such a wide smile that i was afraid of being swallowed. she understood that aunt adeline wouldn't be interested in it until i had time to tell her all about it. anyway, aunt will be going over to springfield on a pilgrimage to see mr. henderson's sister next week. she doesn't know it yet; but i do.

after that i spent all the rest of the evening in planning my dinner-party, and i had a most royal good time. i always have had lots of company, but mostly the spend-the-day kind with relatives, or more relatives to supper. that's what most entertaining in hillsboro is like, but, as i say, once in a while the old slow pacer wakes up.

i'll never forget my first real party. i was bridesmaid for caroline evans, when she married a birmingham magnate, from which hillsboro has never yet recovered. it was the week before the wedding. i was sixteen, felt dreadfully unclothed without a tucker in my dress, and saw alfred for the first time in evening clothes—his first. i can hardly stand thinking about how he looked even now. i haven't been to very many parties in my life, but from this time on i mean to indulge in them often. candle-light, pretty women's frocks, black coat sleeves, cut glass and flowers are good ingredients for a joy-drink, and why not?

but when i got to planning about the gorgeous food i wanted to give them all, i got into what i feel came near being a serious trouble. it was writing down the recipe for the nesselrode pudding they make in my family that undid me. suddenly hunger rose up from nowhere and gripped me by the throat, gnawed me all over like a bone, then shook me until i was limp and unresisting. i must have astralised myself down to the pantry, for when i became conscious i found myself in company with a loaf of bread, a plate of butter and a huge jar of jam.

i sat down at the long table by the window and slowly prepared to enjoy myself. i cut off four slices and buttered them to an equal thickness, and then more slowly put a long silver spoon into the jam. i even paused to admire in jane's mirror over the table the effect of the cascade of lace that fell across my arm and lost itself in the blue shimmer of madame rene's masterpiece of a negligée, then deep down i buried the spoon in the purple sweetness. i had just lifted it high in the air when out of the lilac-scented dark of the garden came a laugh.

"why, molly, molly, molly!" drawled that miserable man-doctor as he came and leaned on the sill right close to my elbow. the spoon crashed on the table, and i turned and crashed into words.

"you are cruel, cruel, john moore, and i hate you worse than i ever did before, if that is possible. i'm hungry, hungry to death, and now you've spoiled it all! go away before i wet this nice crisp bread and jam with tears, and turn it into a pulp i'll have to eat with a spoon. you don't know what it is to want something sweet so bad you are willing to steal it—from yourself!" i fairly blazed my eyes down into his, and moved as far away from him as the table would let me.

"don't i, molly?" he asked softly, after looking straight in my eyes for a long minute, that made me drop my head until the blue bow i had tied on the end of my long plait almost got into the scattered jam. even at such a moment as that i felt how glad madame rene would have been to have given such a nice man as the doctor a treat like that blue silk chef-d'oeuvre of hers. i was glad myself.

"don't i, flower?" he asked again in a still softer voice. again i had that sensation of being against something warm and great and good, and i don't know how i controlled it enough not to—to——

"well, have some jam then," i managed to say with a little laugh, as i turned away and picked up the silver spoon.

"thank you, i will, all of it, and the bread and butter, too," he answered, in that detestable friendly tone of voice, as he drew himself up and sat in the window. "hurry, flower, if you are going to feed me, for i'm ravenous. i've been attending sam benson's wife, and i haven't had any supper. you have; so i don't mind taking it all away from you."

"supper," i sniffed, as i spread the jam on those lovely, lovely slices of bread and thick butter that i had fixed for my own self. "i am so tired of that apple-toast combination now that i forget it if i can." as i handed him the first slice of drippy lusciousness, i turned my head away. he thought it was from the expression of that jam, but it was from his eyes.

"slice up the whole loaf, flower, and let's have a feast. forget——" he didn't finish his sentence, and i'm glad. we neither of us said anything more as i cut that whole loaf; but why should i want to be certain that he touched the lace on my sleeve as it brushed his face when i reached across him to catch an inquisitive rose that i saw peeping in the window at us?