is all for her, and this is only a statue. What difference does it
make which side of the vase is toward a statue? And it looks so funny
to see the wrong side turned to the front. Some day we'll be bringing
Annie Conwell and Jack Tyrrell, and some of mother's friends, up here;
and just think how they'll laugh when they see it."

Larry flushed, but he answered firmly: "I don't care!--the prettiest
side ought to be toward the Blessed Virgin."

"But it is only a statue!" persisted Abby, testily.

"Of course I know it is only a statue," replied her brother, raising
his voice a trifle; for she was really too provoking. "I know it just
as well as you do. But I think Our Lady in heaven understands that I
put the vase that way because I want to give her the best I have. And
I don't care whether any one laughs at it or not. That vase isn't here
so Annie Conwell or Jack Tyrrell or anybody else will think it looks
pretty, but only for the Blessed Virgin,--so there!"

Larry, having expressed himself with such warmth, subsided. Abby did
not venture to turn the vase again. She was vaguely conscious that she
had been a little too anxious to "show off" the oratory, and had
thought rather too much of what her friends would say in regard to her
arrangement of the altar.

It was about this time that Aunt Kitty and her little daughter Claire
came to stay a few days with the Claytons. Claire was only four years
old. She had light, fluffy curls and brown eyes, and was so dainty and
graceful that she seemed to Abby and Larry like a talking doll when she
was comparatively quiet, and a merry, roguish fairy when she romped