CLEAN HANDS.





The servant who summoned Mabel to supper brought down word that she
was not feeling well, and did not wish any.

"Not well! Bless me!" exclaimed Mrs. Sutton, starting up. "Rosa,
love, excuse me for three seconds, please. I must see what is the
matter. I do hope there is no bad news from--" (arrested by the
recollection that there were servants in the room, she substituted
for the name upon her lips)--"in her letters."

"I don't think she's much sick ma'am," said the maid. "She is
a-settin' in the window."

"Where I left her with her letters, an hour and more ago," observed
Rosa. "Don't hurry back if she needs you, Aunt Rachel. I will make
myself at home; shall not mind eating alone for once."

Not withstanding the array of dainties before her, she only nibbled
the edge of a cream biscuit with her little white teeth, and
crumbled the rest of it upon her plate in listlessness or profound
and active reverie, while the hostess was away. She, too, had her
conjectures and her anxieties--a knotty problem to work out, and the
longer she pondered the more confident was she that she had grasped
at least one filament of the clue leading to elucidation.