Jack and she stopped playing in sheer astonishment, while Cousin Kate
went on to explain how many advantages she could give the little girl to
whom she had taken such a strong fancy.

Looking through the lilac-bushes, Joyce could see her mother wipe her
eyes and say, "It seems like pure providence, Kate, and I can't stand in
the child's way. She'll have to support herself soon, and ought to be
prepared for it; but she's the oldest of the five, you know, and she has
been like my right hand ever since her father died. There'll not be a
minute while she is gone, that I shall not miss her and wish her back.
She's the life and sunshine of the whole home."

Then Joyce could see the little brown house turned all topsy-turvy in
the whirl of preparation that followed, and the next thing, she was
standing on the platform at the station, with her new steamer trunk
beside her. Half the town was there to bid her good-by. In the
excitement of finding herself a person of such importance she forgot how
much she was leaving behind her, until looking up, she saw a tender,
wistful smile on her mother's face, sadder than any tears.

[Illustration: WHERE JOYCE LIVED]

Luckily the locomotive whistled just then, and the novelty of getting
aboard a train for the first time, helped her to be brave at the
parting. She stood on the rear platform of the last car, waving her
handkerchief to the group at the station as long as it was in sight, so
that the last glimpse her mother should have of her, was with her bright
little face all ashine.

All these pictures passed so rapidly through Joyce's mind, that she had