Mr. Dearborn would ask occasionally. "You know I agreed to send you
every winter, and I must live up to my promises."

But Steven made first one pretext and then another for delay. He knew
he could not take Robin with him. He knew, too, how restless and
troublesome the child would become if left at home all day.

So he could not help feeling glad when Molly went home on a visit,
and Grandma Dearborn said her rheumatism was so bad that she needed
his help. True, he had all sorts of tasks that he heartily
despised,--washing dishes, kneading dough, sweeping and dusting,--all
under the critical old lady's exacting supervision. But he preferred
even that to being sent off to school alone every day.

One evening, just about sundown, he was out in the corncrib, shelling
corn for the large flock of turkeys they were fattening for market. He
heard Grandma Dearborn go into the barn, where her husband was
milking. They were both a little deaf, and she spoke loud in order to
be heard above the noise of the milk pattering into the pail. She had
come out to look at one of the calves they intended selling.

"It's too bad," he heard her say, after a while. "Rindy has just set
her heart on him, but Arad, he thinks it's all foolishness to get such
a young one. He's willing to take one big enough to do the chores, but
he doesn't want to feed and keep what 'ud only be a care to 'em. He
always was closer'n the bark on a tree. After all, I'd hate to see the
little fellow go."

"Yes," was the answer, "he's a likely lad; but we're gettin' old,
mother, and one is about all we can do well by. Sometimes I think