David and Mary and Ralph looked at grandma. She trembled and tried to pretend it did not matter.

"Of course, Ma, if you prefer Isabel's room, though your bed is newer and every bit as good as the one Mary and I sleep on."

"I-I think it would be nice," said grandma.

"Well, ma might as well take it." Mary spoke as if it were a new thought just occurring to her. "A spare room don't mean nothing but company, and we don't need 'em. You might clean up in there to-morrow."

"I-I could fix it up to-night," said grandma. She was ashamed because her voice quavered.

"Wait till to-morrow. We're all tired out after the wedding," said Mary. "You got a place to sleep, you know."

Ralph pouted, but about something else. He did not seem to care about the room. To-morrow! It was a certainty, then. She could have Isabel's room, her own room, a room all to herself.

Grandma cleared the table after dinner, taking innumerable little steps between the kitchen and the diningroom. She "brushed up" under the table and put the chairs in order. She washed the dishes then while Mary helped with the drying. Mary's skin was tender, it seemed; hot dish-water hurt it. Grandma's hands were thickened and bent with rheumatism and used to dish-washing.

The dishes done, grandma sat down in one of the dining-room chairs with some sewing, to wait, as she always waited, for the evening to pass. To-morrow night she could go to bed early. Grandma usually found herself growing sleepy right after dinner, and she was ashamed of it; for one of the family always spied her if she closed her eyes for a minute, and would say something about, "There 's grandma asleep again," or, "Wake up, Grandma. You look so funny with your eyes closed and your mouth open." To-night some company came to see Ralph, so Mr. and Mrs. Martin played cards at the dining-room table, quarreling peaceably over their hands. Grandma nodded a couple of times, woke up again. This night was like nearly every other night for the last twelve years, and yet

different, the last night of its kind. Tomorrow night she could go to bed at eight if she wanted to.

At ten o'clock Mr. and Mrs. Martin gathered together their cards, said, "Good night, Ma," and retired. Grandma heard them talking together in their bedroom. They were quiet finally. In the front part of the house Ralph and two friends still talked. If grandma went to bed, Ralph would complain: "We came to get something to eat, and there was grandma stretched out asleep on the davenport. This place looks like a tenement. Can't she wait until my company goes home?"

Grandma sewed as long as she could, but her eyes burned before she had finished. So she folded her hands. It was uncomfortable, the dining-room chair, but of course Ralph did not want her in the living-room, where his friends were. There was a low rocker with arms in Isabel's room!

Grandma woke up with a little start, ashamed of having dozed, and, picking up the evening paper, read for a little while. Her eyes hurt, and she was dreadfully sleepy. Were Ralph's friends going home at last? Now they were just moving around; here they came. The three boys trooped into the dining-room and on into the kitchen. At least grandma had not been in bed; Ralph could not get angry. She was not asleep, even.

"Oh, Gamma," called Ralph, "anything to eat here, cookies or anything?"

"I'm a-coming," grandma answered, as she always answered, and hurried, with quick little steps, into the kitchen. She found a box of store cakes and three apples for them. Mary would probably get angry about the apples, about "feeding the neighborhood," and grandma might have to say that she had taken one of them, the day before, for lunch. That would fix it. Mary and Isabel had gone out then, and had forgotten to leave anything for grandma.

Finally, with a "See you to-morrow, Ralph," the boys left, and Ralph returned to the living-room.

Now grandma could go to bed. She opened the davenport,-it was rather heavy, then brought in, in three trips, her blanket, her sheets, and her pillow

from the hall closet. Stooping over the bed, her back did not really ache so much now, she smoothed the sheets with her bent fingers. To-morrow she could make up her bed in the morning, have it all ready just for turning down at night. Of course David and Mary could not realize how hard it is to make a bed at night, when one has to open it oneself, too, when one is old and very tired. Still, they were good. Had n't they both said she could have Isabel's room?

It took grandma only a few minutes to get ready for bed. She always hurried as fast as she could. She wore a false gray switch to eke out her very scanty hair, and she tucked this up into a roll and slipped it under her pillow. Once she had been guilty of putting it on the buffet, and Mary had passed through the dining-room while grandma was still asleep and had not liked it. False hair on the buffet! One could not really blame Mary.

Grandma fell asleep almost immediately despite the hard rod in the middle of the springs. Some nights that bothered her, though she had learned how to lie so as to avoid it.

She woke up with a start the next morning, and then remembered: it was the day she was going into her own room! It was still early; she did n't hear any one stirring. She was glad of that. She liked to be all dressed before any one had to pass through the diningroom. It was rather awkward being caught still in bed or not completely clothed. This morning, as usual, grandma was the first one to wake up. She got up quickly, and putting on her old gray bath-robe, which hung in the hall closet next to Ralph's raincoat, grandma's dresses, and the family umbrellas, she made the bed. She tucked her nightgown into the pillow slip, next to the pillow, as she always did, for some one was always opening the hall closet if she hung it up there, and saying things about it. She put She put the bedclothes back into the closet, closed and fastened the davenport, depositing upon its sleek and uncomfortable surface the two hand-embroidered pillows that reposed there by day. Grandma hurried to the bath-room; it

was the best time to bathe. If she waited until later, Martin and Ralph were wanting to get in, and at night grandma was too tired. Then grandma dressed. She took her clean house-dress from a pile of three that she had carefully hidden in the buffet-drawer under the kitchen towels. She always put away the laundry herself, and Mary always took the top towel. They 'd laugh at her if they found her dresses there, but even house-dresses have to have some place.

Grandma set the table then, and had the coffee on when Mary came into the kitchen. Theirs was a simple breakfast of stewed fruit, a cereal with milk, and toast. Grandma was so excited she could hardly eat anything. She waited patiently for David to leave with his customary, "By folks; don't work too hard," meant for a great pleasantry. He had an idea that "women have got an easy time of it." It was as if Isabel had never been there. No one mentioned her name; and yet there was her room.

After the dishes were done and grandma had swept and dusted the livingroom, she said, with a careful attempt at nonchalance:

up

"

"I-I believe I'll go in now and fix Isabel's room. I think I'd like "You certainly are hankering after that room, Ma," Mary answered. "Well, you might as well go ahead. Don't put that lace scarf back on the dresser. Isabel 'll want it; and leave all of her things in her closet the way she has them until she comes back and looks 'em over."

"Of course; that will be all right. My things won't take up much room," grandma said pleasantly.

It was a delightful occupation, cleaning up her own room. First she swept it, opening wide both the windows. Then she dusted, going carefully over every round of the two chairs, polishing the mirror and the top of the dresser. She made the bed, putting on her own two sheets; she 'd used the top one only two days. Then grandma brought in her possessions; there were three empty drawers in the dresser and lots of closet space. From the buffet, hidden under towels and napkins, came the morning

dresses, aprons, and decent, thick underwear. From the back partition of the knife-and-fork drawer came grandma's comb and brush of imitation ivory that Ruth had sent to her the year before for Christmas. These, and a silver-plated mirror, once owned by Isabel, but discarded when her father gave her a better one, grandma placed on a clean towel on the dresser. She added a picture of Ruth and Ruth's two children sent to her only a few months before, an old picture of Jessie, and a kodak picture of Isabel and Ralph. Next to this she put a little china vase that had been given to her at a church bazaar five years before, a gay little vase with blue china forget-me-nots on the front of it. To these she added a hand-painted fan Jessie had done years before, and, as a final touch, a faded daguerreotype in a broken frame of Grandpa Martin and herself, taken sixty years ago, sitting stiffly, holding hands. A fine array! The room was in order, her room! Grandma was tired now, but that did not matter. Nothing seemed to matter but the room, a room nobody had to pass through, a room with a door that closed and locked-her own room. All afternoon grandma grandma sat and rocked; Mary had gone to her card club. It was fun just sitting still. She hardly remembered to put on the dinnerdishes in time, and was just finishing setting the table when Mary came home. At eight o'clock, almost as soon as dinner was over and before she felt even sleepy, grandma said:

Grandma

more comfortable than yours, and it 's much older."

"It's a very nice room," said grandma, softly, and went to her own room. Grandma undressed slowly, with a light on and the shades pulled down. Seated in her bath-robe, in the rockingchair, she finished David's sccks, and read a chapter in a book a woman she had met in church had loaned her. It

was a wonderful evening. At nine o'clock she went to bed. It was a fine bed, and all ready to get into just by turning down the spread, and with no bar in the center to have to think about.

Grandma woke up the next morning at her usual time; she was not one who had to depend on alarm-clocks. Then, when she realized where she

was, in Isabel's bed, in her own bed, she lay there luxuriously, instead of getting up immediately on awakening, as she usually did. But she was up and dressed and had the table set in plenty of time. It was nice to dress, with all of one's things spread around ready for one, instead of having to hunt for them in little, secret places, and to be sure that no one would want to pass through one's room or would see one through an open doorway.

It rained steadily for the next three days, but grandma hardly knew it. She was not accustomed to running around much, anyhow. And with a room to herself, going outside for pleasure seemed superfluous. Did n't she have all the pleasure she could think of right there at home? Having a room to

"She worked herself tired fixing up that room in a hurry," volunteered Mary.

"So you got moved into Isabel's room?" asked David. Then: "Women are always wanting to move around. I don't know that her mattress is any

thought it could possibly be. After twelve years twelve years of the dining-room, of hurrying mornings to get up, of waiting nights to go to bed. Well, she had her own room now. was not so much that grandma thought of the room as a reward; she did not believe in things like that. It was just

It

pleasant, complete. She was old, and she had tried to do the right things. She had had hard times, losing grandpa while she was still young and, after grandpa died, when the children were little; but that did not make any difference now, for they had grown up, Jessie and David, into good children, good people. Those hard times were long ago; why, even the nights on the davenport were long ago. This was now, and she had her own room, a pleasant room all to herself, and nice meals. David and Mary and Ralph did not mean to talk unkindly or abruptly to her, for that was just their way; and now that Isabel was gone, things did not seem so crowded. Four people in five rooms is not much; one could not ask for better than that, better than grandma hada quiet, peaceful life with one's son and his wife and their son, and a room all to oneself.

At noon on the fifth day after Isabel's wedding Mary received a telegram from Isabel from Atlantic City, economically using just all of the allowable ten words:

Raining here more fun at home have dinner with you.

Grandma was sorry about Isabel. It seemed a shame her honeymoon should be spoiled. Still, Isabel seemed far away, of no importance, in a different world. Isabel and Walter would go to a hotel and then buy their furniture and get an apartment. Grandma would even help Isabel fix up the apartment if they wanted her to.

Mary telephoned to David about Isabel and Walter coming, and he and Ralph met them at the station. They all came home together, carrying suitcases and talking all at once about the rain, the trip, the things that had taken place during Isabel's absence, little things, letters of good wishes, a delayed wedding gift.

Dinner was an exciting meal that night at the Martins. Walter, in his slow, rather stupid way, described the charms of the hotel room they had occupied, of the lobbies and the grill-room. Isabel, too, occasionally volunteered a word of praise of their trip and of their expenditures.

"We got to start saving now," she

said, "with Walter's salary so small and the prices what they are. It 's awful. We saw Irene Jennings in Atlantic City,-you know, used to be Irene Scott, and she said that they gave up their apartment in One hundred and seventeenth Street and simply can't get another one except for double the price. And when I think of the hovels I saw before I went away, it 's fierce. Ma, did you see that apartment I spoke to you about, the one near the Robinsons', on St. Nicholas?"

"Yes, I was there Tuesday. It 's gone, and the only one left in the building has been raised twenty dollars more than it used to be."

"Gee! I don't know what we 'll do."

Walter grinned. For the first time grandma actually disliked Walter's grin. Until now Walter had been some one for Isabel to marry. Now he became a person, a personality, and to grandma an unpleasant one, too sure of himself, too slow and fat and round and white.

"Prices are something awful," said Walter. "It makes a person wonder whether they ought to of got married or not, eh, Isabel?"

"It ain't that bad, I guess," said Isabel, and gave him a glum look and then a quick smile, which left her face looking more discontented than ever.

"Rents, rents, rents," said David Martin, solemnly. "You bet I was smart. I saw what was coming. I always look ahead. I took a four years' lease here. Now I've got them where I want them. They can't pull any monkey-shines on me. Some folks take the biggest apartment they can pay for, with elevators and a lot of fancy trimmin's, and sassy niggers in the hall. 'Don't give the landlord all your money,' I always say."

“You said it," answered Walter.

After dinner the family went into the living-room. Usually only two lights were lit, but this was a festive occasion, so all four lights in the immense and hideous central chandelier were turned on, and both lights in the equally ugly glass table-lamp.

Grandma decided to go to her room early, but it would n't look right, running away, just yet, so she sat stiffly in a straight chair near the phonograph.

"We'd better be getting along," Walter said at last. "I might as well ring up from here and find a hotel room. We came right on from the station and did n't stop to get any. Always can find a room in some hotel, though."

He went to the telephone in the hall. "Only thing they had-room and bath for two, eight dollars. I turned that down," he reported. Then added: "Seven dollars for room and bath"; then: "That one 's all filled up; nothing doing there." Then: "They want eight dollars, too. I told them nothing doing. Highway robbers! They can't play me for a rube."

Even then grandma did not suspect what was to follow. It was David who spoke, still proud because Isabel had finally acquired a husband.

"I say, you folks, what you want to be running around in the rain for, finding a hotel room? You got your suitcases here. Why not stay? Ain't we got room?"

"Sure we have," agreed Mary. She was the type of woman who never gets used to men, no matter how long she has been married. Despite her lack of good looks and charm and her prim, almost austere ways, she coquetted ever so slightly with every man she met, a mere suspicion of a giggle, of a flourish, a combination of shyness and self-consciousness. She did this now and added, "I could n't think of my daugh

ter-and my new son-going out in this weather, as if we did n't have a home for them."

"But you have n't got room enough, I'm afraid," protested Walter, politely. "We got my room," said Isabel.

Grandma understood now-understood, trembled, but refused to believe. She wanted to say something, but could n't. What could she say?

"Grandma 's got that," said Ralph.

"She has?" Isabel was cool, almost a bit sneering. "She was in a hurry about it, it seems to me."

"You-you said I could have it; always said I could," grandma's voice quavered. She wanted to add something important, vital. She waited.

"Yes, we did say if Isabel went away you could have her room," said David, heavily; "I'll agree to that. But Isabel ain't away. Isabel's right here." He gave his slow, patronizing smile. "We can't put Isabel out, can we-Isabel and her husband?" he went on. "What's the use of them going to a hotel or hunting around in times like these for an apartment? If they found one, they 'd have to give the landlord all they 've got. No, sir, as long as I got a roof over my head, my home is open to my children."

There was a pause. Martin looked around, expecting praise for his eloquence.

"Well, if you insist," said Walter,