"SHE CLIMBED UP IN FRONT OF THE MIRROR".
"THE SWEET LITTLE VOICE SANG IT TO THE END".




CHAPTER I.


It was one of the prettiest places in all Kentucky where the Little
Colonel stood that morning. She was reaching up on tiptoes, her eager
little face pressed close against the iron bars of the great entrance
gate that led to a fine old estate known as "Locust."

A ragged little Scotch and Skye terrier stood on its hind feet beside
her, thrusting his inquisitive nose between the bars, and wagging his
tasselled tail in lively approval of the scene before them.

They were looking down a long avenue that stretched for nearly a quarter
of a mile between rows of stately old locust-trees.

At the far end they could see the white pillars of a large stone house
gleaming through the Virginia creeper that nearly covered it. But they
could not see the old Colonel in his big chair on the porch behind the
cool screen of vines.

At that very moment he had caught the rattle of wheels along the road,
and had picked up his field-glass to see who was passing. It was only
a coloured man jogging along in the heat and dust with a cart full of
chicken-coops. The Colonel watched him drive up a lane that led to the