your papa to read you a letter which he has just received from Italy, and I
went out to pick up some of your favorite apples, the first of the season,
and here I come to find you crying!"

Catalina became a little calmer hearing the word "letter," for, to the poor
confined invalid, a letter from abroad was a great event. Nevertheless,
between her sobs she remarked, "Is it a letter about this terrible 'Paula'
that they are talking about?"

"Yes," answered Teresa, with that soothing voice of hers. "It's a letter
that tells us a bit about a niece of your poor mother."

Catalina calmed down completely. If the memory of our mother still lived in
the heart of her other daughters it had first place above all else with
Catalina.

"Now, read it to me, Catalina," said Teresa. "You can do so much better
than I can in the reading line, and it will sound so much better from your
lips than from my poor stumbling ones. Wait till I fix up the pillows, and
don't cry any more. And now your headache is better, isn't it?"

"It still pains terribly, Teresa. Let Rosa read it."

Rosa took the letter, and read in her clear, sweet voice the lines that had
so stirred us all.

There were but few details. Our Uncle John had died; so wrote the pastor of
the little church in that far-off Waldensian Valley. He had died as he had
lived--a real Christian. He had no near relatives, it appeared; and the
rest of the family had gone to America two years before. Paula, therefore,