retired village. There was no maid now, nor other servant whatever.
Mamma Bee did the cooking and sweeping, her face worn and anxious, while
Gran'pa Jim walked the floor of the little sitting room day by day, only
pausing at times to read to Mary Louise stories from her nursery books.

This life did not last very long--perhaps a year or so--and then they
were in a big hotel in another city, reached after a long and tiresome
railway journey. Here the girl saw little of her grandfather, for a
governess came daily to teach Mary Louise to read and write and to do
sums on a pretty slate framed in silver. Then, suddenly, in dead of
night, away they whisked again, traveling by train until long after the
sun was up, when they came to a pretty town where they kept house again.

There were servants, this time, and horses and carriages and pretty
clothes for Mary Louise and Mamma Bee. The little girl was sent to a
school just a block away from her home. She remembered Miss Jenkins
well, for this teacher made much of her and was so kind and gentle that
Mary Louise progressed rapidly in her studies.

But the abrupt changes did not end here. Mary Louise came home from
school one afternoon and found her dear mother sobbing bitterly as she
clung around the neck of Gran'pa Jim, who stood in the middle of the
room as still as if he had been a marble statue. Mary Louise promptly
mingled her tears with those of her mother, without knowing why, and
then there was a quick "packing-up" and a rush to the railway again.

Next they were in the house of Mr. and Mrs. Peter Conant, very pleasant
people who seemed to be old friends of Mamma Bee and Gran'pa Jim. It was
a cosy house, not big and pretentious, and Mary Louise liked it. Peter
Conant and Gran'pa Jim had many long talks together, and it was here