setting the table herself. "For you know, Esther, the sprigged tea-set
is so hurt if any one but me arranges it. Yes, of course, it is only a
fancy, I know that. But the sprigged tea-set does feel so badly if I
neglect it. All the pink in it fades quite out. You must have noticed
it, Esther?"

The girl sighed and gave in. Usually Aunt Amy's vagaries troubled her
little. Disconcerting at first, they had quickly become a commonplace,
for the coming of Aunt Amy to the doctor's household had been too great
a blessing to invite criticism. Esther had soon learned to express no
surprise when told that the sprigged china had a heart of extreme
sensitiveness, and that the third step on the front stair disliked to be
trodden upon, and that it was dangerous to sit with one's back to a
window facing the east. All these and numberless other strange facts
were part of Aunt Amy's twilight world. To her they were immensely
important, but to the family the really important thing seemed that,
with trifling exceptions, the new inmate of the household was gentle and
kind; her housekeeping a miracle and her cooking a dream. In the years
she had lived with them there had been but one serious thrill of
anxiety, and that came when Dr. Coombe had discovered her endeavouring
to infect Jane with her delusions. This had been strictly forbidden and
the child's mind, duly warned, was soon safeguarded by her own growing
comprehension. Jane quickly understood that it was foolish to shut the
garden gate three times every time she came through it, and that no one
save Aunt Amy thought it necessary to count all the boards in the
sidewalk or to touch all the little posts under the balustrade as one
came down stairs. Some of the prettier, more elusive fancies she may
have retained, but, if so, they did her no harm.

As for Aunt Amy herself, she lived her shadow-haunted life not