"It's simply stunning," Dorothy was saying eagerly, as they passed. "I'd rather have it than forty new houses. When it's restored it will have such an air! I don't suppose they appreciate it at all, do they? Oh, do get hold of it before anybody tells them!"

"Max says Sally is crazy to live in it. But that can't be because she realizes its value."

"No, she's just old-fashioned child enough to like it because it's homelike, and her uncle and grandfather lived in it, not because it's such a swell type of the real old thing that people rave over now."

"Max isn't the sort to care for it either. But he has an eye on the cash. I shall have to put up a fair price, all right, to get it. I'll try bluffing first, though. He's too much of an office grind to care for anything else, so long as he gets his money. I say, won't that gateway be a corker, when it's put right?"

They walked on out of hearing, but Max had heard all that was necessary to make him tingle.

"Oh, it will be a corker, will it?" he said to himself, as he made for the back of the house by way of the pine grove. "Maybe it will, old, man—but not when you put it right! An office grind, am I? Too dull to know a good thing when I own it, eh? And you'll try bluffing, will you? All right, bluff away—and much good may it do you! I'd sell it to Jarve Burnside before I'd sell it to you, but I—Hello, where are you going?"

He had almost run into Jarvis, hastily emerging from the kitchen door with a smoking jack-o'-lantern, the declining candle of which had made of it both a wreck and the source of a horrible odour. Jarvis cast the pumpkin to one side and wiped his hands on his handkerchief. "Just prevented a small conflagration of corn-stalks," he explained. "What are you doing, prowling round your own back door?"

"Making up my mind not to sell this place to you or to anybody else," said Max, promptly, speaking under the impulse of his irritation.

"Good work! I don't blame you. I certainly don't want it—if you do. I hope you won't go back on letting me rent a few acres, though, to try my hand at farming, in the spring?"

"Jarve,"—Max sat down on the kitchen step—"do you seriously think a fellow could make a living off this land—taking into account all the squash-bugs and fruit-tree pests and tomato-grubs and every other thing that I've always understood makes the life of the farmer miserable?"

"I think," replied Jarvis, laughing a little at Max's way of putting it, but awake to the importance of discussing the matter seriously, if Max showed an inclination to do so, "that trying to do it, with the help of all the experience that modern experiment stations have placed at our hands, would be about the most interesting thing possible. You might not want to give up all other business till you had proved that you really could do it, but I certainly do think the thing would be well worth trying. It's being attempted more and more these days by educated men, college graduates and professional men of all ranks, partly for the pure interest of the thing, partly because the out-door life is about the best worth living. Look at Don Ferry, for an example. Could he possibly have the hold he has on that crowd of his at the Old Dutch if he weren't a man made of substantial flesh and blood, his brain as healthy and his heart as warm as exercise and oxygen can make them?—Well, perhaps he could, if he were one of your pale and scholarly ghosts, but I doubt it."

"This idea of living out here in winter—" Max went off on a new tack—"it's seemed to me absolute foolishness. But if Neil Chase is so, confoundedly anxious to move in before we can move out—"

"Neil Chase!"

"Yes. He practically made me an offer for the place to-night."

"Well, well!" Jarvis's eyes gleamed with satisfaction in the darkness. So old Neil was helping the thing along, was he? Nothing could have been better. "Going to consider it?"

"Hardly! See here, could we keep warm in that barracks this winter?"

"You don't have to live all over it. With those fireplaces and waste wood enough in your lot up there to run a blast-furnace, I don't see why you should have any fear of freezing."

"Our little stock of furniture wouldn't go anywhere in furnishing."

"It would furnish a certain amount of space. Keep the rest shut up till you could furnish it."

"I shouldn't think of the thing for a minute," said Max, in the tone of one who explains the inconsistency of so sudden a change of attitude, "if I hadn't this day been notified that the price of our flat is to go up ten dollars a month on the first of November. It's an outrage!"

"It's an extraordinary piece of luck," said Jarvis to himself. But aloud he admitted that it was a good deal of a jump, and a pretty high price for the flat.

At this moment some one looked out of the kitchen window, and then asked Mary Ann inside if she had seen anything lately of Mr. Max.

"I suppose we'll have to go back to the crowd," admitted Max, and they returned just in time to see the first guests taking their leave.

When all had gone, Jarvis hunted up Sally. He found her in one of the dressing-rooms, extinguishing candles which had nearly burned to the bottoms of the lanterns, and were threatening their inflammable surroundings.

"Here, don't touch those things, with your thin clothes on!" Jarvis cried. "We fellows must go round and make all safe—no taking any chances with the house full of dry corn-stalks. But first—have you had a good time to-night?"

"A glorious time. All the evening I've felt as if I lived here—it looked so furnished, somehow, with all the lights and decorations."

"It made you want to live here more than ever, didn't it?"

"It did, indeed. And in ten days we shall be going back to town,"

"Perhaps you won't."

She stared at him. "What in the world do you mean?"

"I don't mean anything," said he, laughing. "I'm like a small boy bursting with the secret information that there's to be ice-cream for dinner. So I don't mean anything—but I'd like to shake hands on it, just the same."

"Jarvis!" She let him seize both her hands and shake them up and down. "You do mean something!"

"Come out in the hall and do the corn-stalk prance with me."

"The corn-stalk prance! What in the world is that? Are you crazy?"

"I'll teach it to you," and he led her out into the wide hall, which had been all the evening the most attractive spot in the house. He pulled two stalks from one of the sheaves which stood on each side of the great fireplace. He handed her one, and throwing the other across his shoulder as if it were a gun, marched to the drawing-room door. The musicians were just putting away their instruments, having played till the last guests were out of hearing.

"Just one more, will you?" he asked, grinning at them in a way which they understood meant an extra fee.

Then he came back to Sally. "Now for it!" he said. "I never did this myself,—nor heard of it—but if we can't do an impromptu turn to-night, on our high spirits, we never can again. Come on!"—as the music burst forth. And he made her an impressive bow.

Smiling, and ready enough to follow his lead, Sally returned him a sweeping courtesy, in minuet style.

"Hi, what's this?" cried Bob, returning from the porch, where he, with the others, had been watching the departure of the procession of carriages and automobiles which had borne the guests away.

"Here, come and see what's going on!" he shouted back to the porch, and they came hurrying in. Mrs. Burnside and Donald Ferry, Josephine and Max, Mrs. Ferry and Alec and Uncle Timothy ranged themselves along the walls, their faces all enjoyment of the somewhat remarkable affair now in progress.

Jarvis and Sally might have been improvising, there was no doubt that they were, but the result was the product of inspiration. Up and down, double and single, in and out, round and round, with all manner of fancy steps, both surprising and picturesque, saluting each other every now and then with bows, with wavings of the corn-stalks, with gestures of greeting and farewell.

Jarvis, without his glasses, his face brilliant with life and merriment, looked a different fellow from the one his friends had been accustomed to see of late; and Sally, her cheeks like crimson carnations, her eyes dark with fun and happiness, her steps the embodiment of youthful grace, was a fascinating figure to watch.

"Isn't that the prettiest thing you ever saw?" asked Josephine of Donald Ferry, as he stood beside her with folded arms.

He nodded.

"I suppose they're making it up as they go along," he said, "but it's very clever and charming. I didn't know your brother had it in him to be so gay."

"Oh, he has. It's this long bother with his eyes that has made him look like an owl, and feel like one. He has plenty of fun and energy in him when it gets a chance."

"I'm beginning to find him out. I like a chap who can relax like that, and show the boyish side of himself now and then."

"And isn't Sally perfectly dear? I never saw her look prettier than to-night," declared Josephine, with an unconscious glance from Sally's white frock, which she knew was an old and much mended one, down at her own pale blue gown, just home from an expensive shop. She was thinking that if she looked half as well in her fine things as Sally in her simple old ones, she should be quite content.

Ferry looked down at the dark head beside him. He remembered no less than three fair maids who had, that evening, called his attention, by one means and another, to points less attractive than their own in other girls. It struck him, as it had done more than once before, that a very warm generosity characterized the friendship between Josephine and Sally, inasmuch as each had seemed to him to be most anxious to have him appreciate the charms of the other.

As for Josephine herself, though he would not bluntly tell her so, she had seldom presented a more winsome picture than to-night. Her dark colouring and piquant features possessed a quality very close to beauty, and her smile at Sally, at a moment when the girl, sweeping close, made her friend a special salutation, was undoubtedly a very attractive thing.

A burst of enthusiastic applause greeted the final whirl and bows of the "corn-stalk prance," and Sally, breathless, dropped upon the bottom step of the wide staircase. Jarvis, coming close to Max, whose hand-clapping was of the heartiest, said in his friend's ear, "Why not tell her now that you've decided to stay here? If you do, you'll make this the happiest night of her life."

Max looked at him. Sally's elder brother was in a more genial mood than he had been in for some time. Somehow his new understanding that the Lanes possessed a more valuable piece of property than they had realized, property for which two buyers were ready at any hour to give them a satisfactory price, had put him into good humour. Then he had been all the evening playing the pleasant part of host under conditions which had called forth many complimentary remarks from guests whose opinions he valued, and he was experiencing the comfortable glow which comes with such a role.

Just now, the sight of his little sister making of herself so charming a spectacle, had caused him to feel an unusual stirring of pride in her. All these factors combined to help Jarvis's suggestion.

He approached his sister as she sat, rosy cheeked and laughing, on the lowest stair, and stood before her. "That wasn't so bad," he said, approvingly. "You and Jarve had better get out a copyright on that—you worked in some pretty fancy steps. Got your skates on to-night, haven't you?"

Sally thrust forward a small, white-shod foot. "No, only some badly used-up pumps. If it hadn't been for Bob and his pipe-clay they would never have been presentable again."

"You're certainly great on making things go. Er—that is—suppose you could make six chairs, a table, and an old couch furnish that room in there—for the winter?"

Their eyes met. Those who happened to be observing from a little distance—and of these there were at least three who had as yet been unable to take their eyes off Sally—saw such a wave of delight sweep over her expressive face as made it even more vivid than they had ever seen it. After an instant's wide-eyed silence, her lips parted, the girl was on her feet.

"Max! Do you mean it? Are we to stay? Oh—you old dear! Make our things furnish that room? Of course I can!"

Her arms were round his neck for the space of two seconds; then she had seized his hand, and was pulling him toward the others. Jarvis, watching Max's face, saw there more amiability than he could have hoped. Yet it would have been a strangely flinty heart, he thought, that could have resisted Sally to-night.

"Ladies and gentlemen,"—Sally made them a low bow,—"we are so glad you've enjoyed our hospitality. Allow us to express our hope that we may have the pleasure of entertaining you often during the winter. We shall be at home here every Saturday evening throughout the season—pop-corn refreshments and corn-stalk-fiddle music, with conversation!"

Bob was first to respond. With a shout, he dashed into the long drawing-room, from which the musicians had now departed, and relieved his feelings by turning a series of handsprings from one end of it to the other.

Alec, who had not much cared to spend the winter in the country, but had of late become immensely drawn toward Donald Ferry, reflected that there might be good times forthcoming out here which would never happen in town. So he grinned pleasantly enough.

Uncle Timothy, beaming, said, "That's very good!" to Mrs. Burnside, and she returned warmly:

"Indeed, I think it is, Mr. Rudd."

Josephine clapped both her hands, then ran to wring Sally's and Max's, declaring joyfully:

"You'll be the most popular resort outside the city."

Jarvis followed, to observe, in a calm tone—to cover his delight, though he succeeded in only partially concealing it from Max, and not at all from Sally—"I think it's a wise decision, and I hope it will mean a partnership in strawberries and squashes next summer. You'll see me out soon with seed-catalogues—since we didn't find any behind that locked door last April."

"We shall be so glad to have such neighbours for the winter," said Mrs. Ferry, with genuine pleasure in her face. "And I hope Donald and I can do something toward making you feel that you have real country neighbours of the kind who are counted as assets."

"If it weren't for you people, I don't think I should have the courage to try it," acknowledged Max.

"We'll make it such a winter you'll never have the courage to go back," prophesied Ferry. "I have a pair of toboggans stowed away somewhere; I'll send for them when the snow comes. That slope from your timber lot down across the fields—"

Bob, returning from the handspring episode, caught these words and raised a whoop of anticipation. "Hi—toboggans!" he was heard to ejaculate at intervals during the next ten minutes.

"Sally," said Uncle Timothy Rudd, "up in New Hampshire, where I used to live before I came to stay with your family, there is an attic full of old furniture which belonged to my father. I have never disposed of it, because certain associations made me have an affection for it. It is pretty old style, and not, I am afraid, in very good condition, but if you care for it—"

"Oh, Uncle Timmy! No matter how old it is or how shaky, we can use it."

"Probably the older and shakier it is, the more valuable when it has been restored," suggested Mrs. Burnside.

"I should say so," declared Jarvis, with emphasis. "You should have heard the Neil Chases rave over some of theirs. Neil found a sideboard in an old cabin down South; it had the doors nailed on with strips of leather; they kept corn meal and molasses in it. He wouldn't take five hundred dollars for it now."

"I don't imagine," said Uncle Timothy, cautiously, "that any of my things are as valuable as that, so don't get your expectations too high, Sally. But they may help you in the matter of supplying chairs and beds for your friends. I take it this will be a hospitable homestead, when Sally is mistress of it."

"How could it help being hospitable," cried Sally, happily, "with friends like ours for guests?"

"Let's make a circle on the hearth, for good luck," proposed Josephine.

Beckoning, she led the way toward the fireplace, where the flames of the big logs, which had leaped and danced there all the evening, carefully fed by Bob from time to time, had now died down into a mass of brilliant coals.

On either side the sheaves of yellow corn-stalks stood like sentinels, and above a row of jack-o'-lanterns, whose candles had been renewed when they threatened to burn low, looked cheerfully down from the high chimney-piece.

"All join hands," commanded Josephine, "and sing 'Auld Lang Syne.'"

"Will you let such new acquaintances join in that song?" asked Mrs. Ferry, as Alec, who was next her, caught her hand in obedience to orders.

"Of course we will. We hope that time will make you old friends," answered Uncle Timothy, gallantly, stretching out his hand, as he stood next upon her other side.

It is rather curious how, in any such grouping, certain combinations come about. Neither Jarvis Burnside nor Donald Ferry seemed to make any abrupt moves, and there certainly was a moment when it might have seemed the natural thing that Jarvis should grasp Uncle Timothy's hand, Ferry seize upon Bob's. But so it did not turn out.

When the circle began slowly to revolve before the fire, one of Sally's hands was in Jarvis's, the other in that of the neighbour who could chop down trees as easily as he could address audiences, and whose hand, therefore, possessed a warm and even grip which suggested both friendliness and strength. Upon Donald Ferry's farther side was Josephine, and Max clasped her other hand. As for Alec and Bob, it did not matter much to them whose hands they held, so that the circle moved briskly and sang lustily. And this it surely did.

"Are you happy, little girl?" asked Jarvis, bending to speak into Sally's ear, as the circle broke up.

Smiling, Sally dashed away a tear. "So happy I'm almost crying," she owned. "It's beginning to seem as if we were going to have a—home, a real home once more—as much as we ever can—without—"

"I understand," he whispered, and led her away down the hall, that she might recover the poise the singing of the old song had shaken.

"They must have been here often when we children were little," she murmured, pausing by the open door under the staircase, which led to a side porch. Just here she was hidden from the rest.

"I'm sure they were. I remember driving out here once with your father, and seeing him sit in front of that hall fireplace with your Uncle Maxwell, talking business. They were here more, I imagine, when you were very small, than afterward, when you were old enough to remember."

"They've been here," said Sally softly. "They've walked about these old floors and looked out of these windows. That makes it home to me. And if I can only make it home to the others—"

"You couldn't help making it home—anywhere."

"Oh, Jarvis, you're such a good friend!—I keep telling you that, till you must be tired of hearing it."

"I'm not tired of hearing it."

There followed an eloquent little silence, during which Jarvis took the girl's hand in both his own and held it close in a way which meant to her the comprehending sympathy with all her joys and sorrows which he had long given her. To him it meant so much more that he dared not give expression to it in any but this mute fashion. But his heart beat high with longing and with hope, though he was firmly bidding himself wait—and wait a long time yet before he put his fortune to the touch, "to win or lose it all!"

Then Sally wiped her eyes, put her handkerchief away, and faced about.

"Now I can go back," she said. "Thank you for giving me a chance to put Sally Lunn in order. The mistress of a mansion like this must always have herself in hand, mustn't she?"

Standing on her own hearth-stone, Sally said good-night to all her guests like the grand lady she gayly affected to be. But like the girl she was, she ran after them to wave her hand at them from the big porch, crying, "Come again—please all do come again—oh, very soon!"



PART TWO

THE LANES AND THE ACRES



CHAPTER XI

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

"Well, here he comes," announced Maxwell Lane. With his hands in his pockets he was standing by a window which commanded a view of the gateway and approach to the house. "He 'phoned me this morning he'd be out—loaded for bear. I'll wager if he has one treatise on farming in that cutter he has forty."

Sally ran to look. "I don't see anything unusual," said she, her eyes on the trim sleigh drawn by a pair of fine grays, the driver waving an arm at the window as he caught sight of the faces thereat. "Expect to see horse-hoes and threshing machines sticking out from under his furs? Jolly!—that's a magnificent fox-skin robe he has over his knees. Looks like a farmer, doesn't he, now? Think a fellow in a silk-lined overcoat and driving-gloves like those knows anything about farming?—Or ever can know?" he added skeptically.

"I don't see why not. There's nothing about a silk-lined overcoat to prevent." Sally's tone was spirited. She thrust her hands into the pockets of the small ruffled apron she wore, and her elbows assumed an argumentative air. The black ribbon which tied her lengthening curly locks into a knot upon her head seemed to acquire a defiant effect. Evidently she was prepared to take sides in this matter. "If rich men's sons can learn railroading and mining and every other kind of business that soils their hands, I don't know what's to prevent one of them from learning farming."

"Oh, he'll get hold of a tremendous amount of book wisdom—I'm prepared for that," admitted Max. "But it takes a practical man to be a farmer. He'll want to use up a lot of money in experiments, of course—"

But Sally had disappeared into the hall, and was throwing open the front door. The sleigh, however, was going on past the house to the barn. "That means he intends to stay," reflected the girl and ran back to the kitchen for a few hurried words with Mary Ann Flinders. It was not the habit of the house materially to change any plans for the table on account of unexpected arrivals, but there were certain dishes Jarvis was known to enjoy so much that Sally liked to confront him with at least one of them, when she could.

"Make some of the apple-fry to go with the baked beans, please, Mary," she directed. "And be sure to put in plenty of sugar so it will get brown and candied, the way we like it. Use the Baldwin apples, and leave the red skins on the slices—that makes it look prettiest."

She peeped into the small kitchen mirror as she went by, the mirror whose presence was designed to point out to Mary Ann that her rough red locks might now and then need smoothing. Sally's own hair was the source of considerable bother at present, it having reached that stage, in its growth since her fever, when it was neither short nor long, and called for much skill in arrangement. She tucked in a stray curl or two, gave a perk to the black bow, stood on her tip-toes to make sure that the silk knot which fastened her sailor collar was in trim shape, and felt of the crisp strings which tied her decidedly coquettish apron, to ascertain that that bow was also snug. Then she looked round at Mary Ann, and caught that young person eyeing her slyly, but with great admiration. Sally laughed, and Mary Ann giggled. Then the latter glanced significantly out of the kitchen window toward the barn, whence a tall figure was issuing with its arms full of books and magazines.

"I guess I'd know, Miss Sally," ventured Mary Ann, "who was comin' if I didn't see for myself. Apple-fry, an' you primpin' up like that when you don't need it at all, bein' always tidy—"

"Mary, I'm surprised at you," said Sally severely, and walked out of the kitchen with her head up. But she had laughed, and Mary Ann was not afraid.

"Ridiculous!" said Sally to herself, in the hall. "I shall never look in that kitchen glass again, when anybody is here. As if I ever did any special 'primpin'' for an old friend like Jarvis! Girls like that are always thinking silly things." And she walked on to the hall door, of half a mind not to open it after all, lest Jarvis himself think his welcome too eager. Yet, as she always did open it for him, or for any other of their special friends whom she chanced to see approaching, she promptly discarded this line of conduct as absurd, and threw the door wide with the hospitable sweep to which he was so accustomed that he would have been surprised and puzzled at its absence.

He looked at her over his armful of books, his face red with the sting of the sharp January air, his eyes keen through the eye-glasses astride his nose. Goggles were now a thing of the past, but the eyeglasses, their lenses thick with the combination of formulae which had ruled their grinding, were a permanent necessity. It was the first time Sally had seen him since he had acquired them.

"Very becoming," she said, critically, as he put down the books on the hall table, pulled off the handsome driving-gloves which, according to Max, helped to disqualify him for his present ambitions, and shook hands with heartiness. "You no longer look pathetic, but distinguished—even scientific."

"'Scientific' is the word, if you want to flatter me," he declared, throwing off his overcoat and gathering up the books again. "I'm acquiring agricultural science by the peck measure—chock full and running over. I've reached the point where I must get rid of some of it upon my partners or suffer serious consequences. Max here? Was it he at the window? I can't see more than a rod through these things yet—not used to them."

"Yes, he's here. He always spends his Saturday half-holiday at home now. The rest are away. Alec and Bob are off on the hill by the timber lot, trying Mr. Ferry's toboggan with him—it's just come. Uncle Tim has gone over to see how they're making it go."

"Glad the coast is clear. It might embarrass me to set forth my schemes to more than two at once."

Sally led the way to the living-room—in old times the "drawing-room," but now deserving the less imposing title after a fashion which made it the most homelike of apartments. It was the only room on the lower floor—except the dining-room and kitchen—which the Lanes had attempted to furnish for the winter, so the rugs and chairs, tables and couch, of the little flat had been all that was necessary to make it habitable and pleasant. A brisk fire burned on the wide hearth, of itself a furnishing without which many a sumptuous room may seem cheerless and in-hospitable. The walls were covered with a quaint old paper of white, with gold stripes about which green ivy leaves wound conventionally. This might have given the room a cold aspect, but Sally had hung curtains of Turkey-red print at the windows, and had covered the couch and its pillows with the same warm-coloured fabric, with a result so pleasing to the eye that visitors, at the first sight, were wont to exclaim: "Who would think you could have made this big room look so homelike? How have you done it?"

"Thirty-two yards of Turkey-red," was Sally's customary demure answer, and the visitor, if a woman, was sure to respond, "Oh, yes, of course. Such a lovely idea for winter." If a man, he was more apt merely to stare at Sally, with real respect for the feminine comprehension of the influence of a hue upon a general effect, not understanding the matter himself, but dimly comprehending that the result had been accomplished and the room made to look like a refuge from the bitterest storms which might sweep outside.

"Well, primed to the muzzle?" was Max's greeting. He had not taken the trouble to go to the hall to welcome the guest, but had thrown himself among the red pillows, facing the fire. The wide couch stood always in comfortable proximity to the hearth, and was a favourite resort for the entire household. Not unadvisedly had Sally covered the eight pillows with the strong red fabric. It could withstand the wear and tear of pillow fights and of use as seats upon the floor before the fire better than almost any material that could be found at the price.

"Look at the titles of these, and see if I haven't a right to be primed. Mother and Jo have taken turns reading to me for a week—they too are possessed of an extraordinary amount of miscellaneous information."

"Miscellaneous—that's undoubtedly the word. It will be a long day before any of us have any classified and usable knowledge to work with."

With a critical eye Max scanned the titles of the books as Jarvis set them forth in an impressive row upon the old mahogany table where the reading lamp stood, surrounded by books, magazines, and papers, in generous quantity.

"Strawberries—Market Gardening—Analyses of the Soil—Bacteria—Nitrogen—Drainage—Agricultural Implements—Increasing the Fertility of the Land—and so forth—and so forth," Max murmured, as his eye ran hurriedly along the subjects represented. "Well, you've certainly gone in deep."

"Nearly submerged, at times. But I think I've got my head out of water now, and have evolved a scheme that will do to begin on—with your approval. I wish you'd go at the reading of these—some of them, anyhow. I've marked what seemed to be the most important. You can do it while I'm away. I'm planning to take a trip around to the best farms I can hear of, and have a series of talks with the owners. I shall end up with a scientific experiment station, for by that time I ought to have some working knowledge to build on, and can understand what I'm trying to get at."

From among his pillows Max gazed at his friend. Saturday afternoon was always a time of relaxation for the bank clerk, when he could get through with his work and hurry home. He did not as yet feel a particle of enthusiasm over the farming plans, and it was difficult for him to comprehend Jarvis's interest. But he had ceased to oppose the project, except by comments skeptical to a degree. Jarvis was to assume the risk of all expensive experiments during the first two seasons, and Max was not to leave the bank, so there was everything to be gained and nothing to be lost by giving the experimenter a free hand.

Jarvis was sitting bolt upright by the table, his shoulders back, his head up, energy in every outline. Sally, studying him, and remembering his long exile from all active labour while his eyes were recovering from their misuse at college, silently rejoiced in his appearance of vigour. Just now, as he spoke of his plans, he seemed especially full of life and determination, and the contrast between the two young men was one which made the girl wonder rather anxiously if they could really become partners in this new enterprise.

"When will you go?" Max inquired. "Wish I weren't tied to a desk. I'd go too—for the trip."

"I wish you could. You'd enjoy not only the trip but the interviews. I'd guarantee your interest before we'd made half our rounds."

"Any idea what you'll make the chief crop?" Max inquired, his eyes again wandering over the titles of the books.

"Strawberries," his prospective partner responded, at once.

"Strawberries! Expect to make a living off those?"

"Strawberries!"—This was Sally, in a tone of delight. "Lovely! I'll help pick. Can we have them next June? Oughtn't we to have sowed them last fall?"

A roar from the young man on the couch, and an irrepressible broad smile on the face of the one by the table, made Sally colour with chagrin. "I suppose I've said something awful?" she queried.

"Max and I'll make worse blunders than that before we are through," Jarvis consoled her, while Max, chuckling, attempted to instruct his sister and prove that after all he did know a thing or two about farming.

"You don't sow strawberries for a crop," he explained, wisely, "you set out plants. And you don't get a crop the first year, either—eh, Jarve? So Sally needn't begin to make a sun-bonnet to wear picking berries next June."

"Nor the second June, either, perhaps," admitted Jarvis, reluctantly. "To get the best results we shouldn't use land that's just been ploughed where there's been only sod for years. We ought to plant potatoes or cabbages the first year, to get the ground in shape. Then it'll need a lot of fertilizing after that. We have to get rid of the grubs in the old sod—"

"Grubs!" Max sat upright with a jerk. "There you are, at the first drop of the hat. Grubs—pests—not only after you get your plants out but two seasons beforehand."

He eyed his friend, as if he had presented a conclusive argument against strawberry raising. But Jarvis only laughed good-humouredly.

"That's part of the game," said he. "Meanwhile, there are some quick crops we ought to be able to market the first year. But, after talking with several city dealers and commission men, I'm confident it will pay us to go about strawberry culture with the most careful preparation we can make. Some cities are surrounded by strawberry gardeners, but there's almost nobody in that business around here. No reason why not—soil and climate all right enough—so it seems to me it's our chance. The city gets most of its 'home-grown' strawberries from a hundred miles away, which means that they can't be marketed as fresh as ours can be. I propose to build up a demand for absolutely fresh berries, picked at dawn and marketed before the dew is off, strictly fine to the bottom of the full-sized basket. Several grades, but our reputation on the big ones, of course. There's no reason why we can't do it—"

But he had gone as far as could have been expected without an ironic comment from Max. "Oh, it's all clear as daylight!" that young man agreed. "Even the grubs that infest the soil now will take to the woods when they hear of the onslaught that's coming. We've only to set out the plants, sit on the fence till the gigantic berries are ripe, than haul in the nets. No May freezes, no droughts, no—"

"You are a pessimist, aren't you?" Jarvis broke in. "I know of only one thing that will ever work a reformation in you—and that's a summer's work in the open air."

"Pessimist, am I? Well—"

It was Sally who interrupted, this time. During Jarvis's explanation of his plan she had been absorbed in the contemplation of a new idea. She proceeded to launch it against the tide of Max's retort, and her enthusiastic shriek overbore his deeper-toned growl. "I've a name for this place!" she cried, clapping her hands. "A name! I've tried and tried to think of one, you know, Jarvis, and nothing has suited. Uncle Maxwell never named it anything. Uncle Timothy thinks 'The Pines' would be a good name but I'm sure there are hundreds of country places called 'The Pines.' Alec says 'Woodlands,' and Bob votes for 'Farview'—though there's no far view at all till you get up to the hill by the timber lot. But now—I have the name!"

She spoke impressively, and they both looked at her, waiting for the revelation about to fall from her lips. She did not keep them waiting long.

"'Strawberry Acres.'"

Silence ensued. Sally looked from one to the other. Max began to laugh.

"Better call it 'Prospective Strawberry Acres'" said he.

"It's certainly an original name," mused Jarvis. "Not a high-sounding one, certainly. But you don't want a high-sounding name—for a farm."

"It's a nice, colourful name," argued Sally.

"'Colourful!'—Now, by all that's eccentric, what's a colourful name?" demanded Jarvis, laughing.

"Think of strawberries among the green leaves, in the sun—Jarvis, let's have green leaves on all the baskets!—and think of crushed strawberries, and the beautiful, rich, red juice. It's a nice, rich name, just as my Turkey-red curtains make a warm, homey-looking room."

Jarvis shook his head. "These are mysteries too deep for my imagination," he owned. "But you can call it 'Pumpkin Hollow,' if you like—that's a colourful name, too, I should judge—a fine natural yellow."

"Oh," Sally exclaimed, "we must raise pumpkins, among the corn—of course we'll have corn. Pumpkins lying about among shocks of corn in the fall sunshine make the most delightful picture."

Max lay back among his pillows, apparently overcome with emotion. "Oh, you're a practical person for a farmer's housekeeper!" he jeered. "Your one idea will be to have the crops look pretty in the sunshine. You'll be tying ribbons on the strawberry baskets to match the fruit."

Sally nodded. "Maybe I shall," she acknowledged. "Anyhow, I know people buy the things that are most artfully put up."

A loud bang of the front door made her pause to listen. Hurried footsteps clattering through the hall prepared the party for the bursting open of the door. Bob, his cheeks like winter apples, his boots crusted with snow, shouted at the company:

"Oh, pull yourselves loose from this stuffy fire and come up on the hill. Mr. Ferry's toboggan goes like lightning express from the top of the hill clear down to the big elm in the middle of the south meadow. He's a dandy at it. I can't steer the thing yet, at all, but he'll teach me. Put on your duds and come on—he sent me for you."

Max settled himself more reposefully than ever among his pillows. "Go 'way," he commanded. "My half-holidays are not for work."

But Sally sprang to her feet, seeing which Jarvis got promptly to his.

"Sorry we haven't blanket tobogganing suits, Bob," said Jarvis, "but we can try it in derby hats and kid gloves. I'm ready."

Sally rushed away to array herself in a miscellaneous costume composed of Max's gray sweater-jacket, Bob's crimson skating cap, Uncle Timothy's white muffler, and a short, rainy-day skirt of her own. The others eyed her approvingly as she rejoined them, the crimson cap on her blonde curls proving most picturesque. Out of doors the colour in her cheeks, stung by the frosty air, presently brought them to match the cap. By the time the three reached the hill they looked as ready for sport as Donald Ferry himself. That young man, in a regulation toboggan suit of gray blanket cloth, with a cap of the same, looked like a jolly boy as he brought the toboggan into place with a flourish and invited his guests to "pile on."

It was glorious fun. Certainly Ferry was an accomplished tobogganist, for he steered with great skill over a somewhat complicated course, including excursions between trees set rather closely together, over hummocks and through erratic dips, at a pace which quite took his passengers' breath away.

"It's the best fun I ever had in my life," cried Sally, as they climbed the hill for the third time. "What a shame for Max not to come."

"We'll have him out next time. To taste tobogganing is to become an enthusiast," declared Ferry, walking at one side of the crimson cap, while Jarvis kept close upon the other. Alec and Bob were doing tricks in the snow all the way up the hill, to the amusement of Uncle Timothy Rudd, who watched interestedly from the top, but could not be prevailed upon to try a journey.

Suddenly Sally looked down toward the house. She shielded her eyes with one hand.

"There's Mary Ann Flinders, watching at the kitchen window," she exclaimed. "Poor child, how she must envy us!" She stopped short and looked at the toboggan's owner. "Why can't we ask her up for a little while, Mr. Ferry?" she suggested. "You wouldn't mind, would you?"

"Not in the least. Shall I go for her?"

"I'll go. Please don't come." And Sally was off like the wind, down over the path which much tramping had made through the snow. Jarvis and Ferry looked at one another and smiled.

"Do you know another girl in the world who would have thought of doing that?" asked Jarvis, with amusement.

"Not many, out of those who happened to have devoted cavaliers beside them, certainly," admitted the other young man, looking after the rapid transit of the crimson cap across the snowy fields. "But Miss Sally is a law unto herself—and the unexpected is the thing one may expect from her every time. Yet she's not capricious purely for the sake of being capricious, like so many girls. She can be counted on—at the same time that one doesn't know exactly where to find her." He laughed. "There's a paradox for you."

"Counted on to do the thing you're glad afterward she has done," supplemented Sally's old friend.

If Sally could have heard them, her small ears—burning with the transition from cold air to warm, as in the kitchen she hurriedly forced Mary Ann, protesting with feeble giggles, into whatsoever garments could be adapted to the purpose—would have burned even more fiercely. But it is quite safe to say that she had no thought whatever of the effect her impulsive little act might have upon anybody—except Mary Ann herself.



CHAPTER XII

IN THE OLD GARDEN

"Mother, won't you drive out to the farm with us? Jo will tell you I drive like a veteran, and the roads aren't bad—with chains on the rear tires."

Jarvis's hand was on the door as he spoke. He wore a motorist's cap, coat, and leather gauntlets.

Mrs. Burnside shook her head, smiling. "I'll make my first trip into the country when the chains are not needed, son. Give Sally my love, and tell her that now spring is at hand I shall come out with you often."

"Let me tell her you'll come out and spend the whole season there. Furnish the west side of the house, take Joanna, share expenses—and chaperon her."

"Whom—Joanna?" Josephine Burnside, sheathing herself in veils for the drive in the chilly early April air, glanced at her brother with a mischievous air. "She's forty, if she's a day. Surely she doesn't need—"

"I wish you people would take me seriously. Could you find a pleasanter place to spend the summer? I expect to spend every daylight hour of every day there, from the fifteenth of April on."

"Then it's you who need the chaperon," declared Josephine. "Uncle Timothy Rudd is dragon enough for Sally."

"I shall want to be out there for every noon meal. Can't break off work and rush home three times a day, even with the new car—and she'll make it in twenty minutes, when the roads are good. I shall have to take my lunch in a pail, like my farm hands, if you don't come, for I'm not going to cast myself on the Lanes for food, except now and then."

"Come on, I'm ready. Talk to me about it on the way out, and when I come back I'll put it to mother so artfully she can't refuse." And Josephine took the control of the door-knob out of her brother's hand.

Jarvis applied himself silently to his steering-wheel until they were out of the city, for although after a month's practice he drove with considerable skill, he had not yet reached the point where steering through city traffic becomes purely mechanical. But once on the open road, with few vehicles in the way, Jarvis continued the subject.

"Do you think mother really dislikes the idea? It seems to me the most practical in the world. Those west rooms would be fine, furnished with summer stuff—I wouldn't for the world have you put anything in them that would make the other part of the house look shabby by contrast."

"Jarvis! As if we would! Why, it would be just mattings and wicker chairs, muslin curtains, and that sort of thing. And I think mother rather likes the idea. But she is afraid we should be forcing ourselves on them, as we did last summer with the tent. She doesn't doubt they would all like it, except Max. But he's so queer—he never likes what he's expected to."

"Max is the very one who would favour it this time. He said the other day he wished I could live out here, since I'm to run everything this season. I said I'd like mighty well to be on the ground, but couldn't, of course, in the circumstances, unless the family were along. He said, 'Set up for yourselves in the west wing, and be here to get up with the lark, in the approved farmer's style. I propose to sleep till the last minute, and let the early birds get all the worms they like.'"

"Oh, he was only joking."

"Of course he was joking, but I feel certain he'd favour the plan. He has reason to give me my head in every way, hasn't he? I'm equipping the place with farm tools and machines at my own expense, hiring help out of my own pocket, and taking all the risk. If I can't have the west wing for the summer I'll send back that disc-harrow that arrived yesterday—I'm as proud of it as I am of the car."

"Would you dare mention it to Sally?"

"The disc-harrow—or the plan? If she likes the plan as well as she does the harrow, she'll welcome it with open arms. I tell you, if I could strike the sparks out of Max with an expensive seed-sower that the mere sight of a set of hoes and rakes for her flower garden does with Sally, I'd be content. No, I don't dare mention it to Sally, but I should think you might. She'd certainly be delighted to have you and mother there—and she has to have me there anyhow, whether she likes it or not."

"Whether she likes it or not! Of course she likes it! Aren't you and she the best friends in the world?"

"I'm not so sure. Sally's good friends with everybody—but 'the best in the world'—well—I don't know!"

His tone was peculiar. Josephine looked quickly at him, through her enveloping veils. He was staring at the road ahead—as the driver of a high-powered motor through April mud must do, of course—yet his sister thought she detected a curious compression of the lips not due wholly to the strain of driving under difficulties.

"You're not afraid of her next-door neighbour, are you?" ventured the girl, casually, as if she meant nothing by the query.

"I like him immensely, as you know," was the quick reply. "And trust him, too—like a brother. But—well—it's no use talking about it. It's a fair field and no favours—and I can't complain of that. But—I'd rather like the advantage of being on the ground all summer, don't you see? Alone, there, even though I'm off in the fields half the time, I'll have to be everlastingly careful that I don't make myself intrusive. With you and mother there, the whole situation would be different. You do see, don't you, Sis?"

He looked round at her for an instant, to search her face beneath the masking veils, confident that if he could be sure of her sympathy his sister was the strongest ally he could have. The subject had never been brought up quite so definitely between them before, although Jarvis had no doubt that both mother and sister understood the long persisting intention which within the last year had grown in him so overwhelmingly strong.

The machine, after the manner of motor-cars, took the opportunity of his momentary relaxation of vigilance to skid rather alarmingly in a particularly slippery section of clay road. Though Jarvis promptly brought it about and had things in hand again, Josephine forgot to answer while she resumed control over the function of breathing. But when her brother gently repeated his question she answered warmly:

"Indeed I do, boy—and more clearly than I have before. For myself, I should love to spend the summer with Sally, and I'll do my best to bring it about."

That was all he wanted, and he plunged into talk about the farm, what had been done, what was being done, and what remained to do. It seemed that, while much had been accomplished, a mountain of tasks remained. The place had been running down so long that every inch of it required immediate taking in hand.

"There's not much to expect the first year in the way of crops," he explained. "We shall plough all we can in April, and sow it in May to buckwheat."

"Buckwheat! What do you want of that?"

"Nothing—but to turn it under and give the ground a chance to enrich itself. All the north meadow we shall let come to the haying—by the way, that'll be a jolly time for you to be there. I believe Sally has great plans for the haying. The old apple orchard we had carefully pruned in February, and we're going to plough it—Sally's not pleased at that, she says it will be prettier not ploughed; but the poor old roots need to be saved from starving. We nearly came to blows over that, and of course I was sorry to oppose her about anything that has to do with the beauty of the place. But the quickest road to lasting improvement is the one we must take, and I hope there'll be enough more blossoms on the trees in the future to make up for the loss of the grass."

"You won't lose ground with Sally by opposing her, now and then. She'll come round in the end to seeing you're right."

"I'll have plenty of chances to win favour by opposition with everybody. Even Mr. Rudd has his ideas about what ought to be, because of what was when he was a boy on the farm up in New Hampshire. Max wanted the new fence posts of ash, though locust is much more lasting, and there's plenty to spare in the timber lot. As for the neighbouring farmers, they're already keenly alive to our first efforts, and some of them are watching eagerly to see us make mistakes—but not all. There are several who are progressive enough themselves to want to see us win out with modern methods."

"With all your studying, I suppose you'll make some mistakes."

"Mistakes!—Dozens of them. But we won't make the same one twice. Jo, if you could have heard those fellows talk whom I heard on my trip, the ones who run the really successful farms on scientific methods, you wouldn't wonder at my interest."

He was still talking away when he turned the car in through the now restored gateway. It may be worth while to mention that the first thing in which Max had shown a real interest was the restoration of that gateway. He had declared—nobody knew why—that it must be in absolutely correct shape before the Neil Chases came through it again. So the mason who came to mend the broken chimney found himself, much to his surprise, put first at the tumble-down stone pillars of the gateway. The carpenter, also, who arrived prepared to repair the porch columns and floor, and to mend the broken shutters, was led at once by the young master of the place to the gateway and instructed that he must make the old gate itself substantial, and hang it so that it should swing true. But although it was nearly six months since the Chases had tried to buy the place, they had not yet driven through that restored gateway. Possibly they did not care to be in haste to look at the place they could not own.

"There's Sally, in the old garden. She told me she could hardly wait to begin on it," and Josephine waved her hand at a distant figure with a spade in its hand. The spade was promptly cast aside and the worker came running around the house to meet the arriving car. "Isn't she looking splendidly?" Sally's friend murmured in her brother's ear, as the figure came near enough for a pair of very blooming cheeks to show clearly in the April sunshine.

"Never better. Out-door life is going to make her a Hebe," replied the driver of the car, under his breath, though he kept his eyes dutifully on the roadway until the car came to a standstill and he had stopped his engine.

"Come and see the garden, and listen to my plans," commanded Sally, the moment her friends were on the ground. "No, I don't mean Jarvis. I know he has more important business—in the orchard, or the barns, or the woods, or the south lot—"

"Meadow, please," corrected Jarvis, with a smile which suggested past efforts to teach Sally the nomenclature of the farm.

"—or anywhere that he can walk to in the mud, and come back covered with stick-tights, with a tear in his coat. He looks happiest when his clothes are most demoralized and his boots thickest with clay."

"The sign of your true farmer," urged Jarvis.

But Sally had no further attention to bestow on him, and immediately led Josephine away over the damp and spongy sod to that portion of the ground at the rear of the house which showed, by a few lingering signs, that it once had been a proud and stately old-time garden.

"You see the old box border is still in pretty good condition, only winter-killed—is that the word?—in a few places. I shall try to fill those in, for I care more for the box than for anything I could have. See how it outlines all those funny little curving paths, where I suppose roses and larkspur and bleeding hearts and sweet-williams used to grow. They're going to grow again, if I can make them."

"Lovely! I can see it now. And phlox—Sally, you must have masses of phlox—and candy-tuft, and mignonette, and sweet alyssum—"

"And love-in-a-mist, and forget-me-nots, and sweet peas, and hollyhocks. Only the hollyhocks are not going to be in the garden, but in a long row back there, to screen away the kitchen garden from the lawn. Only—oh, dear, you have to wait so long for the things you want most! Hollyhocks don't bloom the first year from seed—and I want to see them there this first summer, pink and white and red and yellow in the sun, like a row of children dressed for a party."

"Can't you get plants somewhere?"

"Perhaps, from the neighbours—only country people don't go in much for the old-fashioned flowers now. They have rubber-plants and hydrangeas—in tubs—just think—in tubs! And geraniums in tomato cans!"

"Sally! Not all of them. They have nasturtiums—."

"Yes, and pink sweet peas beside them, to set one's teeth on edge. By the way, my sweet peas are in!" Her voice proclaimed triumph, and she led the way down one of the damp, moss-grown paths to a sunny spot where a long strip of freshly raked earth showed that somebody had lately been at work. "Bob dug it up for me, Uncle Timmy fertilized it, I raked it and planted the seeds, while the whole family stood around and gave advice. Max wanted them sowed thinner and Alec thicker. I consulted the seed catalogue and the directions on the paper packet, and then sowed them just as my judgment directed."

"As you haven't a particle of judgment—"

"Experience, you mean. No, I haven't experience, but I consider that I have judgment, and I sowed the seeds according to that. In June I will pick you a gorgeous bunch of them."

"In June—if I'm not away somewhere. In which case you can send them to me in a paste-board box."

"Joey Burnside!" Sally picked up a rake lying in the path and brandished it fiercely. "Don't you dare to go away—anywhere. You're to come and visit me—from June till September."

"How would May till November do?"

"Still better. The idea of your expecting me to get along without you, the very first summer I live in a place big enough for anybody to visit me in! You can go off to your fashionable resorts in the winter, if you want to—I can spare you better, then. But this summer! Jo, think of the moonlight nights, with the odour of mignonette coming up to the porch from the garden—"

"I don't think the odour of the mignonette would carry so far."

"We can walk within range, then. And the evenings on the porch, with Mr. Ferry and his sister over—and his sister's friend—"

"I didn't know he had a sister—or that the sister had a friend."

"She's been in Germany the last two years, living with an aunt, and studying music—the piano. The friend has a voice. Oh, we'll have the jolliest times—you can't think. And in July will be the haying. Jo, we'll have larks during haying—real country larks—and a barn dance. You can't go away anywhere—not even for a week-end house party! Say you won't!"

"You artful schemer—I don't see how I can," and Josephine looked as if she couldn't. "But see here, Sally. I couldn't come and visit you here and leave mother alone. You know she would go with me, if it were to the mountains or to the sea-side."

"I'd love to have her come too," said Sally, quickly, "if she would care to. How I wish she would. Then I shouldn't have to bother Mrs. Ferry to come over every time we had the young people all here. If I could just furnish the west wing for you—"

"Why not let us furnish it?" Josephine jumped at her opportunity. Somehow, during the last few minutes she had become firmly convinced that she could not think of spending the summer months anywhere but at the farm. All sorts of pictures had leaped into her mind at Sally's outlines of what the summer was to be. The stage seemed set for happenings of extraordinary interest, from which she did not want to be left out. There would be other things going on at the old place besides ploughings and plantings, harvestings and threshings—or perhaps it might be that these very terms in the vegetable kingdom might come to be used significantly of doings in the human sphere of action.

Sally looked up with a flash of protest in her eyes. "Let you furnish it!" she exclaimed. "Oh, but I couldn't—I know what your furnishing it would mean. Persian rugs and silk hangings, Satsuma jars and cut-glass bowls filled with roses. And on the other side of the hall our poor things would look"—she stopped short, and was silent for an instant. Then, "I'm an envious pig," she owned. "If you'll only come you may furnish it in teak wood and Chinese embroidery, and I'll be contented on my—bare floors."

But Josephine's affectionate arm was around her friend's shoulders. "Sally Lunn," said she, soothingly, "give us credit for better taste than that, entirely from the standpoint of harmony. In a summer home on a farm people of sense don't use Persian rugs or teak wood. We'd put plain white straw matting on the floors, hang muslin curtains at the windows, and use the simplest willow furniture to be had. The windows should be open every minute, and there would be bowls of roses about—only I'd rather it would be sweet-williams or clove-pinks. Sally, don't you adore the old-fashioned clove-pinks, with their dear, spicy smell? And the bowls themselves wouldn't be cut glass—I despise cut glass for old-fashioned flowers, and so do you. Now, will you let us come?"

Sally looked at her friend for a minute, thinking as she did so that for a rich girl Josephine Burnside possessed the sweetest common sense ever owned by anybody. Then she dropped her rake and pulled at Josephine's hand.

"Come!" she cried. "Let's go back and look at the west wing. And the bedrooms over it are the nicest in the house. I haven't used them only because they were so big. But you won't care how many acres of straw matting have to be used to cover them."

"Do you think Max will be willing for us to come?" Josephine asked with some anxiety, as they went in. "You remember, about the tent—"

"Oh, he's anxious now to get Jarvis on the ground. And he's spoken more than once about the desirability of our renting some of our unused space, only of course I wouldn't hear of it, before, to strangers."

Josephine plunged into details. They would bring Joanna for the season, that paragon of cooks. She should assist Mary Ann—

At which Sally laughed, and said that if incompetent little Mary Ann could assist dignified, competent Joanna, it would be a matter for congratulation.

"We'll all dine together every night in the big dining-room, with all the windows also open, and more flowers on the table."

Josephine would have gone on to further details, but as they crossed the hall to the west wing, the knocker on the front door banged with a decisive sound, and Sally opened to find Donald Ferry on the threshold.

"I came on a matter of business," said he, when he had shaken hands, "if you can call asking a favour business. Shall I plunge into it?—A certain storage house in a city near our old home has gone out of commission, and we are notified that everything my mother has had stored there since we left the home must be moved at once. Now that my sister and her friend are to be here with us through the summer we should like to have my sister's piano where she could use it. But"—he spread out his arms with a gesture conveying the idea of great proportions—"the piano is a grand—and not a miniature grand at that—concert size. We couldn't possibly put it in our little house. Would it be asking too much of you to allow it to stand in one of your rooms through the summer, where Janet could do some practising on it? I assure you her practising is of the nature of a morning musicale," he added—as if Sally might need assurance in the matter.

Sally turned to Josephine. "It's a special providence," said she solemnly, "to keep me from envying you your matting and willow furniture. Will you have a concert grand in the west wing? I trow not."

Then she answered to her questioner. "Of course we shall be delighted," she told him. "And as I say, it will have a chastening effect on the Burnside family, who are thinking of furnishing our west wing and spending the summer with us. I'm sure they won't think of bringing a grand piano out here."

Donald Ferry looked greatly pleased at this news. "That's fine," said he. "Mother has been promising Miss Constance Carew and Janet all sorts of pleasures in the country, and I should say this makes a sure thing of it. If four girls on a farm can't have a good time together—even when not aided and abetted by as many boys—there will be something wrong with them—and the boys. Can't we be called boys?—That's great news. And I may tell mother you will prove your good friendship by taking the white elephant of a piano? May we send it right away? You see, since it must be moved at once, it had best come where it is to stay. And we'll send around a tuner. Please use it all you can, just to keep it in good shape."

"I'm not the tiniest sort of a musician," said Sally regretfully. "But Josephine is—she'll keep it in tune for you. I'll merely see that it's dusted."

When he had gone Sally and Josephine looked at each other. "Miss Burnside," said Sally, solemnly, "I feel it in my bones that you and Miss Ferry and Miss Carew and Miss Lane are to take part, this summer, in a melodrama of thrilling interest. Country setting, background of hay-field, with cows coming down the lane. Curtain rises to the time of 'Sweet Lavender.' Miss Burnside is discovered, sun-bonnet on head, rake in hand, pretending to accomplish the bunching up of one hay-cock before the sun goes down. Enter at right young city clergyman, also in rustic attire. At the same time, enter, left, Miss Carew, in rival sun-bonnet. Miss Burnside gives one glance at her rival—"

But a warm hand over Sally's saucy mouth, and a protesting—"Sally Lane, if you begin that sort of thing I won't live a minute in your west wing,"—put an end to the stage directions.

"All right, dear," agreed Sally. "We won't talk any such silly stuff. We'll be four little country girls together, playing in the hay, and if we want to go barefoot we will—when there's nobody to see. But I hope, don't you, Jo? that 'Miss Carew' isn't as grand as she sounds!"



CHAPTER XIII

AFTERNOON TEA

"I feel," said Sally Lane, impressively, "that the way to receive them properly is to have afternoon tea on the lawn. What is the use of having a lawn—even though it's still rather hummocky—and four magnificent ancestral oaks—ancestral oaks sounds like an English novel—if we don't have afternoon tea on It—under Them?"

She stood in the doorway of the front room in the west wing, where Mrs. Burnside and Josephine were sitting, the one busy with some small piece of sewing, the other writing letters at a desk.

"Are they coming over before we call on them?" Josephine inquired, with poised pen. "Coming to-day? Why, they only arrived last night."

"I saw Mr. Ferry this morning, and he said he did not want to wait for us to come over with our hats and gloves on and call, he wanted to bring the girls and his mother over this afternoon, so as to lose no time in having them find out what was on the farther side of the hedge. I asked him why he hadn't brought them with him then—it was at eight o'clock this morning. But he said he wanted to bring them himself, and he was then on his way to his car—otherwise he thought he should not have hesitated at all on account of the hour. He said they were crazy to come."

"Sally! He didn't say they were crazy to come."

"He didn't use that particular word, perhaps—men never do, of course. But he said 'eager,' or 'anxious,' or something like that—it means the same thing. Evidently they've been told all about us. What would you give, Jo Burnside, to know how we've been described?"

"We probably haven't been described. Men never describe people. They just say, 'She's all right, you'll like her,' or something equally vague."

"It would give me a chance to wear my lilac muslin," mused Sally quite irrelevantly, but Josephine caught her meaning.

"Afternoon tea on the lawn? Then do let's have it. Anything to see you in that lilac muslin."

"Then we'll trail over the lawn to meet them—only the lilac muslin doesn't trail—and we'll hold out our hands at a medium sort of angle, so that we'll be prepared to reciprocate whatever sort of high-low shake fresh from abroad they give us. Since Dorothy Chase came back last fall she gives a side-to-side jerk that stops your breath short just where it happens to be at the moment. What do you suppose they'll be like? Young ladies from two years' residence in Germany, or just plain, jolly girls?"

Josephine shook her head, but her mother replied in a quiet tone of conviction: "I doubt if the daughter of that family will be anything but a simple-mannered girl, no matter how experienced she may be in foreign usages."

Sally nodded. "So I'm hoping. But 'Miss Carew'—with a voice—sounds more formidable. It's for Miss Carew I'm going to have afternoon tea. I'll go out now and make my little cakes. And I'll have very, very thin bread and butter. I've just one cherished jar of the choicest Orange Pekoe, so the tea will be above reproach. And my one pride is my linen—you know how much mother always kept—not only her own but Grandmother Rudd's." Then she vanished, quite suddenly, from the doorway, as if, having once mentioned the mother of whom she seldom spoke, she could not come back again to other subjects until a period of silence had intervened.

"I'm so anxious to see her put away the black clothes," said Josephine to her mother. "It will be good for her to wear the lilac muslin, for now she's made it she can't bring herself to put it on, though she knows how we all want to see her in colours again. Speaking of colours—Jarvis said this morning that by the fence in the south meadow the grass was blue with wild violets. I believe I'll go and pick a big bunch for Sally's tea-table."

"It seems rather early for tea on the lawn," suggested Mrs. Burnside, "though I couldn't bear to damp Sally's ardour by saying so."

"Oh, it's really very warm, and the lawn seems quite dry. I don't blame Sally for wanting to show off the 'ancestral oaks.' It's almost like June."

But—alas for plans which count upon the most June-like May weather—no guests were served with afternoon tea that day except under a roof more substantial than the low-hanging boughs of the great oaks. At mid-afternoon, treacherously enough, the sky showed not a cloud, except over beyond the timber lot, where they had risen to some height before they could be discerned from the lawn. There Sally, lilac-clad, was laying her fine linen cloth, setting out her thin teacups of the old gold-banded china, and arranging Josephine's blue meadow-violets in a curious, engraved glass bowl of Grandmother Rudd's. A small gust of wind, lifting the edges of the heavy damask cloth and nearly capsizing the violets, first called her attention to a change in the weather. Uncle Timothy, bringing out chairs at her behest, paused and scanned the horizon with an experienced eye.

"Looks a little dubious to me, Sally," he observed, although he came on with his chairs. "Company due pretty soon?"

"It's four o'clock—they'll come very soon, for I sent word that we'd have tea early on account of its growing cool after five. Yes—there is a little bit of a dark cloud in the south beyond the woods, but you don't think it will bring rain right away, do you?"

"If it begins to blow, it will—look out, there—" for another brisk little zephyr lifted the corner of the tea-table cloth again, and threatened the teacups. "Weather changes pretty suddenly sometimes, in May."

"But the sun is so bright—and a minute ago I was thinking that it was lucky the branches are so thick on this old oak, for the sunshine was really uncomfortably hot. It can't rain right away. I'll bring out everything, and be ready to offer them tea the minute they've said 'Good afternoon.'"

Sally hurried away to the house, leaving Uncle Timothy standing guard over the tea-table and keeping a weather eye on the gathering patch of clouds.

But it could rain right away, as it presently proved. By the time Sally crossed the lawn with her plates of bread and butter and tiny sugary cakes, Mary Ann following with the tray holding the tea equipage, there were strong indications of what was soon to happen. Sally had not more than decided that it was best to retreat to the porch and await developments, than the first drops on her upturned forehead warned her that the retreat could not be too hasty.

The Ferry party, coming through the gap in the hedge a few minutes earlier than they would have done if it had not seemed expedient to forestall the gathering shower, saw the scurrying hosts. Jarvis and Max were with them, for it was Saturday afternoon. The Ferrys themselves were forced to make haste also, and as a result, guests and hostess, tea-tray and chairs, bread-and-butter and violets, reached the shelter of the big porch at nearly the same time, and sixty seconds later the first pursuing dash of rain rattled against the pillars.

"It's too bad," cried Sally, breathless and laughing, as she turned around to greet her guests, little curls escaping about her forehead and over her ears, in spite of all her previous care to insure their smooth order. But her hand gave warm welcome all around the circle, and she led the party into the wide hall, now transformed by the waxing of its dark floor and the presence of several old-time rag rugs, into a hospitable-looking entrance. "Put the tea-table here by the open door, please, Max," she directed. "We'll be as near out of doors as we can."

At the first sound of voices Mrs. Burnside and Josephine had appeared, and between them things were in order in the new setting in less time than it takes to tell it. A great bunch of daffodils on an old table near the door made the spot seem quite festive enough for the occasion, and Sally, when she had caught her breath and pushed back the distracting curls, proved herself to possess a fair amount of the poise of the accustomed hostess whom nothing can really upset. She rearranged her tea-table just inside the hall door, and before she had finished, a dash of sunshine fell across it, making her declare, as she settled the bowl of violets, that if the shower could just have confined its efforts to her garden, which needed watering, and not to sprinkling the lawn, which didn't need it, she would not have felt so ungrateful to it.

"And we came especially to see the garden," said Janet Ferry. "We've heard of that garden in every letter since the first of April." She looked at her brother with a mischievous twinkle in her hazel eyes, much like his own.

"Do tell me what you have heard," said Sally serenely, preparing to make her tea, and sending Max for the hot water. "The really important things, like the coming up of the sweet peas, or unimportant ones, like the strange way the weeds have of appearing faster than the seeds?"

From the nonchalance of this question it will be seen that Sally herself thought nothing of the fact that items concerning her garden should have seemed of sufficient importance to go into the letters of a brother whose time was ordinarily occupied with affairs much more momentous. The garden was of overwhelming importance to Sally, why shouldn't it be interesting to everybody? But there were two people in the company besides his sister who glanced rather quickly at Donald Ferry. He, however, seemed to think there could be no reason for anybody's minding what he might choose to write about.

"Here were two girls," he said, from his position in the doorway, where he stood leaning against the lintel, watching the process of tea making, "writing long descriptions of all sorts of rural beauties they had discovered in their travels about Germany and France—given them as a reward for long study by a discerning aunt. They professed special interest in gardens. Should I refrain from telling them about the only one in sight, even though it couldn't be said to have reached the show stage?"

"You certainly didn't refrain," said Miss Constance Carew, smiling at him from her seat near Sally. "We were told that if we would spend the summer here, one of our chief joys would be the old, box-bordered garden."

"So long as it helped to bring you, I don't regret it," said he, returning the smile in a way which made those who observed decide at once that these other two were old and familiar friends. Miss Carew, though she was not precisely a pretty girl, was really beautiful when she smiled, and had, at all times, an undeniable charm about her which came from one knew not just what. She was rather tall but very graceful, and her manner had about it an indefinable something which made one like to watch her, admiring each move she made as something done just a little differently from the way other people did it.

Sally poured her tea, and the three young men handed about the cups. Everybody fell to talking at once. Max, who had had an approving eye on Miss Janet Ferry from the first, and had decided that he should much prefer her conversation to that of her more impressive friend, drew up a chair beside her when his duties were over, and presently proved her to be as blithely entertaining as her appearance had promised. She was a small person in stature, but her personality was one not to be ignored. She looked like a miniature edition of her brother, heavy braids of the same red-brown hair wound about her small head, the same brilliant, good-humoured hazel eyes looking out of a prepossessing young face, and the same seemingly quick appreciation of everything other people said and did making her a delightful person to talk with. Max, as he supplied her with bread-and-butter, plied her with questions about her life in Germany, and listened to her vivacious stories of her experiences, thinking that it was a long time since he had met a girl he liked so well.

"You don't know how much it means to Constance and Janet to find two girls of their own sort so near," declared Donald Ferry, bringing his cup to take it with Josephine close beside the doorway. "I think they've been feeling a little dubious over finding us out here in a place which had neither lake, seashore, nor mountains to recommend it."

"Perhaps they're still feeling so," suggested Josephine. "There's not much about tea in a shower to cheer their spirits."

"Do they look as if they needed cheering?"

Josephine glanced from Janet, laughing whole-heartedly at something Max was apparently describing with great eloquence, to Constance Carew, leaning back in her chair and looking up at Jarvis, who stood beside her, with the smile which made her face a picture to study.

"It's delightful for us, I'm sure, that they've come," Josephine said warmly.

"You'll find Janet up to the wildest schemes for sport you can devise. And Constance, though she looks so stately, can unbend like a school-girl. As for her voice—you must hear her pretty soon. Janet is anxious to touch her old piano again, and both are always obliging with their music. They are equal to quite a concert between them."

"So we've been hoping. Sally has dusted the piano no less than five times to-day in anticipation. You can't think what a pleasure it is to Sally just to see that piano standing there. It happens to be almost the precise duplicate of the one that was sold when her old home was broken up."

"I'm glad. I hope she uses it?"

"Not in a way that she would let me call using it. She sits down and plays little bits—mostly out of her head, I think. She—Why, what's that?"

It was Bob, tearing by the front door and yelling as he ran:

"Team running away in the south meadow—man knocked down!"

In an instant three teacups clinked and clattered as they were set hastily down, and three male figures bolted out of the door, without apology further than three ejaculations of surprise and chagrin. Mr. Rudd followed at a brisk walk. As for the portion of the company remaining, they also put aside teacups and plates, and followed Sally to the living-room.

They ran in to the four windows of the long room, between two of which stood the piano. Janet Ferry gave it a private nod and pat as she went by, whispering, "You dear old thing! I'll speak to you as soon as I can."

They could see the runaway team, a plough jerking at their heels, dashing madly across the furrows, one of the horses apparently much wilder than the other. They saw Jarvis, Ferry, and Max reach the rail fence at nearly the same moment, and go over it at a rate of speed which suggested danger to trousers-legs. Bob could be discerned, racing frantically in the wake of the careering horses, and in the nearer distance Mr. Rudd could be heard shouting something wholly unintelligible.

One of the running figures halted near the fence, stooping, and the watching eyes understood that the presumably injured ploughman was lying there.

"It's Don that has stopped," said Janet Ferry to her mother. "Now he'll probably have a new case on his hands. I do hope the man isn't much hurt."

"I can't stay here to look!" cried Sally, and, gathering up her lilac skirts, ran away out of the room. In a moment they saw her flying across the wet grass, her tea-party forgotten.

"I am going too," and Janet Ferry, delicate folds of pale gray silk caught up as Sally had caught up her muslin, was off in Sally's train.

Josephine and Constance Carew looked at each other. The guest nodded. "I don't mind the wet grass," said she—though one glance at the ephemeral fabric of her frock made Josephine say, as the two hurried to the hall, "Had you really better? The grass is soaking."

"Who cares for clothes when there's a runaway?" replied Miss Carew. "Besides, this will tub, and yours won't."

"But the man may be badly hurt," and away went Josephine, high-heeled pumps making her flight a trifle dangerous, over the slippery turf. And her guest ran at her side.

By the time they reached the meadow fence the team had been brought panting to a standstill, cornered by Bob and Jarvis at the far end of the meadow. When Donald Ferry looked up from the prostrate form of the ploughman, he beheld four figures in dainty dresses also brought to a stand-still by a splintery rail fence over which it did not seem discretion to attempt to scramble unless the need were dire.

It was not dire. Jake Kelly had only been stunned by striking his head upon a big stone just upturned by his plough. He was already opening his eyes and the colour was returning to his sunburned face. He put his hand to his head.

"All right," called Ferry to the row of anxious faces by the fence, at which the tense expressions relaxed, and certain dimples began to play. If nobody were seriously hurt, the situation certainly had its amusing side. Five minutes ago they had all been demurely drinking afternoon tea, with the most correct society manners evident on all sides. They had not known each other very well, but each had wondered what the others were like upon less formal occasions. And suddenly a decidedly less formal occasion had been precipitated into their midst.

"Guess I ain't much the wuss for wear," declared Jake Kelly, sitting up. "All's hurt's my feelin's at havin' that there team git away from me like that. The old mare's steady's a clock—thought she could hold the young one down, if he did git lively. Dunno now what he took off at. Serves me right for trustin' 'em a minute while I lit up my pipe."

Bob, on the old mare's back, and Jarvis, at the bits of the young horse, were bringing back the plough undamaged by its brisk career across the field. Jarvis certainly presented a somewhat incongruous appearance in his afternoon attire, as he plunged along the furrows in foot-gear not intended for locomotion over freshly ploughed land. Jake rose to his feet, answering the queries of Ferry at his side as to his fitness for continuing work with a decided: "Sure I am. Sha'n't get even with myself for that fool trick till I've done a good dozen furrows. You don't ketch that there pair o'hosses gittin' away from Jake Kelly again this day!"

"The rescue party may as well go back to the teacups," observed Jarvis, as the whole group, standing partly on the one and partly on the other side of the rail fence, watched the now subdued team take a fresh start under the guidance of a vigilant driver with a large bump on the back of his head, which he had refused to have treated in any way but with contempt.

Saying which, Jarvis mounted the fence—tearing a slight rent near the hem of his trousers-leg because he was not looking where he went. He had been observing the effect of the now brilliant sunshine on an uncovered fair head, and in the fashion of Jake he accepted the proffered sympathy of Bob on the disaster to his clothing with a murmured: "Serves me right for not attending strictly to business."

The company marched back in more orderly ranks than it had come forth. Max found himself by the side of Constance Carew, and discovered that she had quite as strong a sense of humour as Janet Ferry, for she described to him most amusingly the way in which the four girls had abandoned all concern for their afternoon finery, and had rushed forth prepared to help bear a stretcher down a wet ploughed field, or share in dashing about in the attempt to catch the runaway team.

"This is what comes," said he, in reply, and looking around at Sally with mirth in his eye, "of trying to be fashionable on a farm."

"Trying to be fashionable!" cried Sally, behind him, catching the words. "I was merely trying to be hospitable. But Fate evidently didn't mean I should be either. Twice in one afternoon!"

"Let's go back and turn the tea-drinking into a musicale," suggested Ferry. "I know my sister is longing to get her hands on the piano."

"You shouldn't propose to have your own family perform," Janet reproached her brother.

"Why shouldn't I? I haven't heard you play for two years, nor Constance sing for three. No false modesty shall keep me from demanding to be satisfied."

"I heard somebody telling somebody else I had dusted the piano five times to-day," said Sally, as she led the way in, "and I surely ought to be rewarded for such care as that."

So they trooped in, a somewhat less faultlessly attired party than they had gone out, for Sally's curls were more rebellious than ever, Josephine's skirts had a mud stain on their hem, Jarvis's rent showed plainly, and everybody's foot-gear was decidedly the worse for the run over wet sod and fresh earth. But they had left behind them all stiffness born of untried acquaintance, had discovered that there was nobody in the company who could not be depended upon to play a gallant part in whatever emergency might arise, and were in a mood thoroughly to enjoy the remainder of the visit.

Without being asked again Janet went straight to the piano, sat down at it as if it were the old friend it claimed to be, and with one or two affectionate soft layings of her hands upon it in almost noiseless chords, as if she were asking it something to which it responded under its breath, swept into a movement from one of the greatest compositions the world knows.

When she finished she looked up at her brother, who had come to stand close beside the instrument. Her eyes were full of tears, and his were by no means free from a suspicion of moisture. Evidently the sound of the familiar keys had many associations for both, and they were associations which their mother shared, for her face was turned away toward the open window, and she was very still.

But in a minute more Janet had turned to beckon to her friend, and was beginning an accompaniment without so much as waiting for Constance to reach the piano. Smiling, the tall girl found a place beside it just in time to take up her part. And then—the listeners held their breath. The golden notes rang through the rooms and out upon the warm May air, while the singer herself seemed as little to be "performing" as if the song had been a mere child's play tune.

"What made you start with that?" protested Constance, in her friend's ear, the moment it was over. "Such a show song!"

But Donald, from the other side of the piano, leaned across. "Don't mind," he whispered. "Any of the simple things would have done us out just now."

Constance nodded quickly. The next minute, with a word to Janet, she had plunged into a gay little German song, with a spirit in it as light as the spring itself, and every one was smiling.

When they had gone, Jarvis, passing through the hall with a glance into the room where the piano stood, caught a glimpse of Sally standing by the open window, looking after the four who were just disappearing through the hedge. He crossed the room softly and looked out over her head.

"They're all right, aren't they?" said he.

"Splendid!" agreed Sally. "I like them both, even more than I expected." Then she added, in a lower tone, "I'd give the hair off my head to be able to make such music as that, either with my hands or with my voice."

Jarvis, smiling to himself, unperceived touched one fair strand with a reverent hand. "I wouldn't give," said he, "even for such magnificent music as that, so much as that one curl over your right ear—if another wouldn't grow there in its place."

Sally faced about. "The idea!" said she. "Of course you wouldn't. It's not yours, sir, to give! But I'd cut it off, when you weren't looking!"



CHAPTER XIV

TWO AND TWO

"Shall we make the haying a society affair for ladies in French frocks, or an athletic event for a lot of young fellows who don't know a rake from a pitchfork?"

The questioner was a tall young man in corduroy trousers and high boots, a blue flannel shirt and a nondescript hat—though the hat had come off as he approached the garden, where Sally Lane, in blue gingham and short sleeves, was carefully setting out some spice-pink roots.

Sally looked up. She had become accustomed in a measure to seeing the heir of the house of Burnside thus attired, and to noting the daily deepening coat of tan upon his face and arms, but it never failed to strike her afresh as a miracle which a year ago would not have seemed possible.

"I haven't the faintest intention of inviting any ladies in French frocks," she replied. "Do you know any gentlemen in frock coats who wish to be asked?"

"Plenty—but I'm not asking any invitations for them—this time. No—it's a bunch of the Reverend Donald Ferry's friends I want to invite."

"The Reverend—how odd that sounds!—Who are they?"

"News-boys, boot-blacks, office-boys, messenger boys—every kind of boy. He proposes to buy or borrow the rakes and pitchforks, have out a different set of lads for two days running, and present us with the labour of the crowd in return for the lark he expects it to be for them. Janet and Constance will supply the lunch. Of course the amount of work the boys do isn't to be reckoned on like that of trained hands. But our ten acres of hay isn't a tremendous crop, and with Jake Kelly and myself to boss the job, we ought to get through in respectable season, if the weather favours."

"Do have them come. Max is going to let Bob have his way at last, and leave the office, so he'll be on hand, too."

"Good! Bob's been on tenter-hooks all the week, I know, but I didn't know old Max had given in. Alec will be the next deserter from the ranks of the business men. Max may hang on through this season and next, but you'll see him with us the third, or I'll sacrifice my hat." He surveyed the specimen in his hands as he spoke. "Valuable offering it would make, wouldn't it? That hat began its career at a university and ends it on a farm. In my present state of mind I don't call that a come-down."

"Don't you?" asked a voice behind him, and Jarvis swung round to behold Janet Ferry, gloves and weeding instrument in hand. "Then I suppose it's not a come-down for my gloves, bought in Berlin, worn in London, and worn out in Sally's service in a garden composed mostly of weeds."

"Weeds! Will you have the goodness to look at my sweet-peas?" Sally indignantly waved an earth-bestained hand toward the trellis, where three pink, one white, and one brilliant crimson blossom flaunted themselves in the July sunshine as the first blooms of the sweet-pea season.

"I take it back," admitted Janet, "and I'll not call my work 'weeding.' What are you doing, idling here, Mr. Farmer? I thought you never allowed a moment to go to waste."

"I'm not wasting any now," disputed the farmer. "I merely paused a moment on my way to the barn where I intend to rig up a fork for unloading. I'm consulting the Lady of Strawberry Acres about letting your brother's boys come and rake hay for us."

"Oh, yes. He's full of that plan. I'll give you fair warning, Sally, if you give Don half an opening he'll have you overrun here with his proteges. Have you the least idea how many men, boys, and babies he has on his lists? And every one of them is a personal and particular friend of his."

"I know he's a tremendous worker." Sally rose to her feet and surveyed the result of her labours. "They look dreadfully droopy, don't they?"

"You need more water. I'll get it." And Jarvis picked up her sprinkling-can and was off with it.

"I shall be delighted to have the boys come, Janet," Sally went on heartily. "I think your brother's work is fine—great—and if the old farm can help in any way I shall be glad."

"I thought you were arranging to have a house-party from town, and I was afraid his plan would interfere."

"I did plan that, some time ago, but I like this idea much better. What's the use of exerting ourselves to entertain a lot of indifferent people when we can give a jolly time to the ones who never have any fun at all?"

"That's what Don says. And these boys are his special care. He has club-rooms for them in the city, and he's working now to get all sorts of additions to it—baths and showers and gymnasium apparatus. Oh, I think it's fine, too. I didn't at first, when he wrote me about it, but now that I'm here and see for myself, I'm immensely interested and want to help."

They discussed the coming event fully as they worked. It was discussed by everybody during the next few days, and plans were carefully perfected with the view of combining a good time for the young guests with the serious purpose of getting the haying done as promptly and effectually as possible.

So, on a certain day in early July, Jake Kelly cut the hay, the entire ten acres, and reported a fair crop for land that had been running wild so long, a rather rainy spring having helped matters considerably. On the morning of the next day Ferry's boys were to arrive.

"I wish it were a holiday for me," admitted Max, as he left the house to catch his car. "I'd rather enjoy seeing the mess Ferry and Jarve get into with a corps of bootblacks to make hay for them. They'll 'make hay,' all right, mark my word."

"Each of us girls is going to drive one load down to the barn," called Sally gayly, from the porch.

As he ran down the driveway, Max waved his hand with a gesture of despair as if to indicate that this announcement certainly finished the prospect of getting anything done on the farm.

"Don't mind him," said Jarvis, appearing in the doorway behind her. "I'm going to drive out the Southville road about five miles after a hay-fork and tackle I've bought of a man who's selling out. We don't really need one for our small crop, but it's too cheap to refuse. Back in a jiffy. Don't you want to go?"

"Thank you—too busy."

"You don't look it—" for she was starting away at a moderate pace down the driveway, her fresh blue-and-white print skirts giving forth a crisp little sound as she walked.

"But I am. I'm going on an errand."

"Which way?"

"Down the road—Mrs. Hill's."

"Wait a minute and I'll have you there quicker than you can walk."

He ran in for his driving-gloves, and out through the back hall to the old carriage house where the car stood. He was only a minute in getting under way, for he had learned to leave his machine in a condition in which it could be used the next time without waiting to fill gasoline tanks or radiators. It was natural for him to go at things in a systematic way, and he kept his car, as he kept his books and papers, in order, quite without thinking much about it.

But with all his haste Sally had reached the driveway and gone a rod or two down the road before he overtook her. He slowed down at her side.

"Why didn't you wait? Jump in," said he, "and I'll have you there in one burst of speed."

Sally stepped up on the running board and stood there, her arm on the back of the roadster's seat.

"Get clear in, please," requested Jarvis. "There'll be no bursts of speed with you standing there."

"I can hold on perfectly well."

"So can the car stand still. It will stand still till you get in."

Sally took the seat. "Now hurry up, please," said she. "There isn't any use in my getting in at all, just for a foot or two of ride."

The car moved off. "Let's make it longer," Jarvis urged. "Drive out with me for the fork. We won't be half an hour away, and you can't have anything very pressing left on hand, with all the work you girls have done to get ready for those youngsters."

He opened his throttle, as he spoke, and the car responded. Sally shook her head, decidedly.

"No, no—I'm not going. I told Jo I'd be back in five minutes with the big pail Mrs. Hill said we might take for the lemonade."

"They won't need lemonade for two hours yet. Come on—I want company."

"Slow down, please," requested Sally, for the car was already approaching the farm house which was her destination. But instead of slowing down Jarvis deliberately increased his speed.

"I'm in the habit of doing most things you ask me to," said he, "but this time I'm going to have my way. There are plenty of people there to finish it all, this morning. I'll have you back before they miss you." And the car shot by the Hill farm house at a pace which supported his promise.

Sally sat back silently. Although Jarvis went on talking about various things she did not reply, and her silence lasted until, having gone a mile on his way, Jarvis slowed down a little and turned to look at her.

"What's the matter?" he asked. "You're certainly not angry with me for running away with you?"

She nodded, looking straight ahead. This was not like Sally, who, though she possessed plenty of spirit, was seldom known to sulk.

"Well, I'm sorry if you are—but not sorry I ran away with you. You can talk to me or not, but you can't get away. I'm in too much of a hurry to have time to take you back, so I can keep you to myself for one straight half-hour. And that's—whether you know it or not—more than I've had for a month—six weeks—two months."

This declaration unlocked Sally's lips. "How absurd," said she, still gazing straight ahead.

"It may be absurd, but it's true. You may not have noticed it, but it's true just the same. I don't know whether it's intentional on your part or not—and I don't know which I would rather have it, that you've meant to keep away, or that you haven't noticed that you have. I think," he added, judicially, "that not knowing that you have would be much the worse, so I choose to think you've meant to do it. And I want to know why."

He turned and looked at her again. The cheek next him was pink, and momentarily growing pinker. Sally again murmured something which sounded like "perfectly absurd." But Jarvis considered that no answer at all. The car began to climb a long grade.

"Please tell me," he urged.

"There's nothing to tell," said the girl, reluctantly. "There are ever so many of us, now, and we're naturally all together—or some of us are together—"

"And some of us aren't."

"We're just a lot of boys and girls—"

"Are we? I feel rather grown up myself."

Sally spoke quickly. "I'm not. Or, at least, I don't want to be. I want to stay a girl—a little girl, I'd be, if I could—just as long as I can. I want to have good times—all together. Not—two and two." The cheek next him was a very deep pink indeed, now.