time only a dull ache filled her little dreary world. Everything
seemed to ache--the munching cows in the Trumbull pasture, the
cats on the doorsteps, the dog loping along beside the stage, the
stage driver's stooping old back. Aunt Olivia was going to the
city--Rebecca Mary wasn't going to the city. There was no room in
the world for anything but that and the ache.

Rebecca Mary's indignation was not born till night. Then, lying
in the dainty bed under Rhoda's pink quilt, her mood changed.
Until then she had only been disappointed. But then she sat up
suddenly and said bitter things about Aunt Olivia.

"She's gone to have a good time all to herself--and she might
have taken me. She didn't, she didn't, and she might've. She
wanted all the good time herself! She didn't want me to have
any!"

"Rebecca Mary!--did you speak, dear?" It was the gentle voice of
the minister's wife outside the door. Rebecca Mary's red little
hands unwrung and dropped on the pink quilt.

"No'm, I did--I mean yes'm, I didn't--I mean--"

"You don't feel sick? There isn't anything the matter, dear?"

"No'm--oh, yes'm, yes'm!" for there was something the matter. It
was Aunt Olivia. But she must not say it--must not cry--must keep
right on being a Plummer.

"Robert, I didn't go in--I couldn't," the minister's wife said,