mingled with his heavy iron-gray locks as she perched upon the arm of his chair, her scarlet flannel arm under his head. The youngest boy, Justin, threw himself flat on the hearth-rug, chin propped on elbow, watching the fire; sixteen-year-old Jeff helped himself to a low stool, clasping long arms about long legs as his knees approached his head in this posture; and the eldest son, pausing, drew up a chair and sat down to face the group.
"Now for it," he said. "It looks serious--a consultation of the whole. Mayn't we have mother to back us?"
"I've sent mother to bed," Mr. Birch explained. "She wanted to come down to hear you play, but I wouldn't let her. And indeed there are moments--" He glanced quizzically at his eldest son.
"Yes, sir," Lansing responded, promptly. "There are moments when the furnace pipes convey up-stairs as much din as she can bear."
Mr. Birch sat looking thoughtfully into the fire for a minute or two.
He began at last, gently, "Celia--has mother seemed quite strong to you of late?"
"Mother--strong?" asked Celia, in surprise. "Why, father, isn't she? She--had that illness last winter, and was a long time getting about, but she has seemed well all summer."
Their eyes were all upon his face. Even young Justin had swung about upon his elbows and was regarding his father with attention. They waited, startled.
"I took her to Doctor Forester to-day, and he--surprised me a good deal. He seemed to think that mother must not spend the coming winter in this climate. Don't be alarmed; I don't want to frighten you, but I want you to appreciate the necessity. He thinks that if mother were to have a year of rest and change we need have no fears for her."
"Fears!" repeated Lansing, under his breath. Was it possible that anything was the matter with mother? Why, she was the central sun about which their little family world moved! There could not--must not--be anything wrong with mother!
"Tell us plainly, father," urged Celia's soft voice. She was pale, but she spoke quietly.
Charlotte, at the first word of alarm, had turned her face away. Jeff's bright black eyes--he was Charlotte's counterpart in colouring and looks--rested anxiously on the second violin's curly mop of hair, tied at the neck with a big black bow of ribbon. It was always most expressive to Jeff, that bow of ribbon.
Lansing repeated Celia's words. "Yes, tell us plainly, sir. We'd rather know."
"I am alarming you," Mr. Birch said, quickly. "I knew I could not say the slightest thing about her without doing that. But I need to talk it over with you all, because if we carry out the doctor's prescription it means much sacrifice for every one. I had no doubt that you would make it, but I think it is better for you to understand its importance. Doctor Forester says New Mexico is an almost certain cure for such trouble as mother's, if taken early. And we are taking it early."
Justin and Jeff looked puzzled, but Celia caught her breath, and Lansing's ruddy colour suddenly faded. Charlotte buried her head in her father's shoulder and drew the scarlet flannel arm tighter about his neck.
The iron-gray head bent over the curly black one for a moment, as if the strong man of the household found it hard to face the anxious eyes which searched his, and would have liked, like his eighteen-year-old daughter, to run to cover. But in an instant, he looked up again and spoke in the cheery tone they knew so well.
"Now listen, and be brave," he said. "Mother's trouble is like a house just set on fire. A dash of Water and a blanket--and it is out. Wait till a whole room is ablaze, and it's a serious matter to stop it. Now, in our case, we've only the little kindling corner to smother, and the New Mexico air is water and blanket--a whole fire department, if need be. The doctor assures me that with mother's good constitution, and the absence of any hereditary predisposition to this sort of thing, we've only to give her the ten or twelve months of rest and reënforcement--the winter in New Mexico, the summer in Colorado--to nip the whole thing in the bud. I believe him, and you must believe him--and me. More than all, you must not show the slightest change of front to her. She knows it all, but she doesn't want you to know. I think differently about that.
"Three of you are men and women now, and the other two," he smiled into the upturned, eager faces of Jeff and Justin, "are getting to be men. Even my youngest can be depended upon to act the strong part."
Justin scrambled to his feet at that, and gravely laid a muscular boy's hand in his father's.
"I'll stand by you, sir," he said.
Nobody laughed. Charlotte's black bow twitched and a queer sound burst from the shoulder where her head was buried. Jeff's thick black lashes went down for a moment; Celia shook two bright drops from brimming eyes and patted Just's sturdy shoulder. Mr. Birch shook the hand vigorously without speaking, and only Lansing found words to express what they felt.
"He speaks for us all, I know, sir. And now if you'll tell us our part we'll take hold. I think I know what it means. Trips to New Mexico, from New York, are expensive."
"They are very expensive," Mr. Birch replied, slowly. "I must go with her. We must travel in the least fatiguing fashion, which means state-rooms on trains and many extras by the way. She has kept up bravely, but this unusual exhaustion after one day in town shows me how careful I must be of her on the long journey. Then, once away, no expense must be spared to make the absence tell for all there is in it. And most of all to be considered, while I am away there will be--no income."
They looked at each other now, Celia at Lansing, and Lansing at Jeff, and Jeff at both of them. Charlotte sat up suddenly, her cheeks and eyes burning, and stared hard at each in turn.
The income would stop. And what would that mean? The family had within three years suffered heavy financial losses from causes outside of their control, and the father's income, that of attorney-at-law in a large suburban town, had since become the only source of support. So far it had sufficed, although Charlotte and Celia had been sent away to school, and both Celia and Lansing were now in college.
It was the remembrance of these heavy demands upon the family purse which now caused the young people to look at one another with startled questioning. Lansing was about to begin his senior year at a great university; Celia had finished her first year at a famous women's college. Within a fortnight both were expecting to begin work.
Charlotte did not care about a college course, but she had planned for two years to go to a school of design, for she was a promising young worker in things decorative. As for Jefferson, sixteen years old, captain of the high-school football team, six feet tall, and able to give his brother Lansing a hard battle for physical supremacy, his dearest dream was a great military school. Even Justin--but Justin was only twelve--his dreams could wait. His was the only face in the group which remained placid during the moments succeeding Mr. Birch's mention of the astonishing fact about the income.
The father's observant eyes noted all that his children's looks could tell him of surprise, disappointment and bewilderment; and of the succeeding effort they made to rally their forces and show no sign of dismay.
Lansing made the first effort. "I can drop back a year," he said, thoughtfully. "Or I--no--merely working my way through this year wouldn't do. It wouldn't help out at home."
"Why, Lanse!" began Celia, and stopped.
He glanced meaningly at her, and the colour flashed back into her cheeks. In the next instant she had followed his lead.
"If Lanse can stay out of college, I can, too," she said, with decision.
"If I could get some fairly good position," Lanse proposed, "I ought to be able to earn enough to--well, we're rather a large family, and our appetites----"
"I could do something," began Charlotte, eagerly. "I could--I could do sewing----"
At that there was a general howl, which quite broke the solemnity of the occasion. "Charlotte--sewing!" they cried.
"Why not take in washing?" urged Lanse.
"Or solicit orders for fancy cooking?"
"Or