Catherine inscribed the name in her pretty even hand upon a blue card, numbered it 2, and handed it to her patron. He laid down thirty-five cents and turned away.

"O," said Catherine, flushing softly. "You didn't understand. It is only when you get three cards that they are cheap like that."

Chester Holcomb, known as the biggest miser in the county, grunted.

"You said if they was more than three in the family, and they's six children besides ma and me. I knowed there was some skin game about this thing, somewheres. Here's your ticket and you give me back my money."

Catherine, almost as near tears as she had ever been in her singularly well-controlled existence, obeyed him.

"Good evening, Chester." Dr. Harlow had been standing near, and now decided to take a hand. "Let me introduce my daughter. Catherine, this is Mr. Holcomb, of whom you've heard us speak."

"The father of the dear twin babies?" asked Catherine, with a grateful throb for her father's help.

"That's them yonder," answered Chester Holcomb, swelling proudly. "Mate, bring the twins here, so't the doctor's gal can see 'em. Weighed five pounds when they was born, and look at 'em now! Best fatted live stock on the farm, I say, Doctor." And Mr. Holcomb's great laugh at his own witticism filled the room. Catherine, meanwhile, with the sincerity of a girl who really loves all babies, admired the plump twins to such a degree that their father felt himself melting with benevolence.

"Mate," he said suddenly, "think you'd like to read any of these here books? Doc, make you acquainted with my daughter Sadie. Graduated from the district school this spring and goin' to town High School this fall. Guess the' ain't any of the readin'-matter here that's beyond Sadie! Here, Miss, give us three of them tickets,—that one I had and two more. Mrs. Chester Holcomb and Miss Sadie Ditto. There! Keep the change," and gathering up the three cards, he threw a silver dollar heavily upon the table and turned away. Catherine and her father looked at each other and laughed outright.

"No man has ever got the best of Chester in a bargain," said Dr. Harlow, "and I judge no woman ever will! Allow me to make up the deficit. It has been worth more than that as entertainment!"

By this time the room was full. It was a motley crowd, as all classes of Winsted were represented. The would-be Smart Set in rather elaborate hats and gowns, mingled with the quieter Three R's, and their own maid servants and the "gentlemen friends" of the latter. All the standbys, who are always on hand at church doings and the County Fair, were out in force. There was the oldest inhabitant, bestowing his presence with the "nunc dimittis" air which had characterized him since old age had given him the distinction vainly sought in other fields. There was old Mis' Tuttle in her best black and orange bonnet, and Emeline Winslow with her wig over one ear and a bouquet of artificial flowers under glass as her contribution. With her came Grandma Hopkins, whose name was the only nimble thing about her;—ponderous and elephantine, she had once, in calling upon a fragile little old lady, stumbled in the doorway and fallen upon her hostess, whose brittle bones had snapped under the strain. Polly and Dorcas constituted themselves a committee to look out for the elderly ones, taking great pains to keep Grandma Hopkins in open spaces where a fall would do little damage. There was a very bony woman with a smile which was surprising, it was so soft and radiant. She brought a fat story of the Bible for the children, and offered Algernon flowers from her garden for all summer. "Flowers are good for the soul and the mind as well as books," she explained, "and if so be some one comes in and can't find the book they want, 'twon't hurt 'em to see a posy."

There was the Sloan family, decked out in the leavings of a milliner's shop and bringing as offering a worn copy of one of Mary J. Holmes' novels. There was a good-hearted lady, so disastrously given to expressing enthusiasm by embracing anyone within her reach that the heroes and heroines of the evening fought shy of her, and Tom made her well-known tendency an excuse for withdrawing altogether and going out to the fence behind the building where he could overlook the festive scene and smoke a cigar surreptitiously. Not least "among those present" was the ubiquitous reporter for the Courier, biting his pencil and using abbreviations in his notes with such freedom that the list of gifts, when finally published, contained such startling entries as: Eliza and her Germ Garden, and The Victorious Anthropology.

"I felt as though I were in a dream half the time," sighed Polly, when the crowd had dwindled to "the immediate mourners" as Max put it, and these were sitting wearily at the messy little tables, dipping idle spoons into the melted cream that had been with difficulty saved for them. "I kept on smiling and explaining and telling people to go to Catherine for cards and to Bertha to leave their gifts, and half the time I didn't know what I was saying or who was talking to me. Bert came up once and asked me to tell him which door he came in at, and I tried to find out for him, before I tumbled—before I saw the point, I mean. I never was so exhausted in all my life."

"Poor Algernon," said Tom. "You're just beginning your work. Every one of those hundred and sixty-seven cards will be in to-morrow to draw out a book. You ought to keep open for a week every day."

"Three times a week, with evenings, will be enough," replied A. Swinburne, librarian. "There's a big job on those books that came in to-night. How many were there finally, Bertha?"

"Ninety-six. About twenty are worth putting labels on," answered Bertha cheerfully. "I'm a little inclined to think that that part of our plan was a mistake."

"I don't believe it," said Dot. "There was one old duck who brought a German primer, and he strutted around as though he owned the place. I'm sure he'll use it constantly."

"He seemed to think he ought to have a card free, because he gave it," put in Catherine. "I remember him! He wasn't the only one, though. They all—or a lot of them—seemed to think they ought to be able to draw any number of books on one card, and they don't like the idea of fines at all. I don't envy you, Algernon!"

"We ought to have called ourselves the Looking For Trouble Club," groaned Archie. "We haven't had a decent Boat Club picnic since we got into this mess. And look at all this place to clean up to-morrow! I'm about dead with work, already. I don't know about the rest of you."

The rest had strength enough for a chorus of hoots and jeers at "His Laziness," who had adorned the scene of their labor for a few minutes now and then, but for the most part had stayed strictly away.

"I've saved your lives, anyway," declared Archie cheerfully, when their derision had spent itself. "And I'm going to again. I hired a lovely scrub-lady to come to-morrow and make this spot look shipshape—"

"O, Archie!" cried the girls, "you beautiful boy!"

"Don't interrupt," said the beautiful boy sternly. "I am going to vindicate myself. Polly Osgood, didn't that tennis game Friday morning save you from collapse? How about that little canoe jaunt on the quiet yesterday, Catherine? Bess needed a drive Thursday, and Winifred did more good to the public by singing to me all that hot evening than the rest of you did slaving away over some gooey job or other. Dorcas let me reward her Sunday-school kids by a hay-rack ride, and she went along to take care of us. Agnes and Bertha got interrupted on their way down here one morning, and let themselves be persuaded to take a country walk instead, to show me birds' nests for a course I'm not ever going to take next year. And as for Dot,—O, Dot was shamelessly ready to go off any old time with any old body. But you all would have been nervous wrecks by now without me. And you call me names, like an ungrateful populace!"

It was a mirth-provoking series of revelations. "Archie has shown himself a most artistic sly-boots," said Catherine. "I never had more delicious conscience pangs than I did on that canoe-ride."

"So it was with me," declared Polly. "And I never dared say anything sarcastic about the other girls not turning up every time, because I felt so guilty myself."

"So did I!" cried Bertha and Agnes together.

"Well, so didn't I!" exclaimed Dot. "I was perfectly free to say all the time that I didn't intend to spend my whole summer or even ten days of it working harder than I do winters. I move that Archie be given a vote of thanks for introducing the Rest Cure into the Boat Club, and also a vote of admiration for the beauty of his dissimulation."

"I second the motion," said Archie himself, "and amend it to include going home. Want any help in locking up, Al?"

"No, thanks," said Algernon, hearing for the first time a nickname that any fellow might have had applied to himself. "Good night, all of you. I'll take good care of things, you can count on that."

As the rest drifted in pairs and threes toward their homes, a well-content young man set the reading-chairs in their places, put out the low-burning lamps, turned the key in the lock, and walked briskly away, happier than he had ever been.

Even so early, Catherine's inspiration had shown itself a true one.



CHAPTER SEVEN

A PARTY AT POLLY'S

"Where you goin', Algy?"

Algernon, half-way down the walk, turned at these words, high and clear, floating down from upper regions.

In the balcony on the second floor Elsmere, clad airily in white night-drawers, leaned pensively over the railing.

"To the party, you know. Go back to bed, Sonny."

"But the party is to Peter and Perdita's, over there,—" with a gesture across the street. "Why do you be goin' that way?" The fat little arm waved in an opposite direction.

"I'm going to get Catherine. Do go in, now, Elsmere. I'll tell you all about the party in the morning," and Algernon hastened down the street, bouncing more than usual in his effort to get out of reach of that penetrating little voice.

"Why," it called after him, "why? Doesn't Caffrine know the way to Peter and Perdita's house? What you goin' to get her for?"

The neighbors on their porches smiled, and Algernon reddened as he rushed along.

Elsmere, abandoned, still draped himself over the railing and watched his brother's rapid walk.

"Springs!" he murmured at last, as though he had solved a knotty problem. "Algy walks like a spring seat!"

Then with a lighted candle Elsmere proceeded to make some preparations for an evening of festivity. The party at the Osgoods' was so near that Peter had assured him the music for the porch dancing would reach him even more clearly in his balcony chamber than if he were a really invited guest and on the spot. Peter had further coached him in the method of preparing porches for dancing, and Elsmere had secreted a candle and matches early in the evening, waiting only till Algernon was safely away to apply them. His floor nicely waxed, he curled down in a corner of the balcony to watch the arriving guests, and unexpectedly fell asleep.

"Walk on your heels, why don't you?"

Algernon, escorting Catherine, made this suggestion as she picked her way across a narrow muddy crossing, her white party skirts gathered in one hand. Catherine, poising with difficulty on the toe of one foot, turned and looked at him.

"It just muddies my heels, and then my heels muddy my skirts. Of course, you boys with trousers—" then, toppling, she righted herself and leaped across the last puddle.

"Trousers," said Algernon, getting to her side again, "were worn in Abyssinia as early as—"

Catherine heaved a mighty sigh.

"It's like going out for a stroll with the Century Book of Facts to walk with you, Algernon Swinburne," she declared suddenly. "Do you think in statistics party-nights, even? Haven't you any uninstructive thoughts for warm evenings?"

Algernon regarded her silently.

"Am I such a bore?" he asked quietly.

Catherine caught her breath. She recalled swiftly her father's having said: "If Algernon should once find out that he was a bore, it would probably cure him. He has a lot of sense." And here he was finding it out, on her hands, just because she had, for once, made her groaning comment on his conversation audibly instead of to herself!

It was a serious moment.

"Listen, Algernon," she said, feeling for words. "I wasn't very polite to say what I did, but I'm not going to take it back now. It's really wonderful how you know so much, and people who use the library are appreciating it. But you see, you've lived by yourself all these years, accumulating information, and when you get among people you do have a little way of handing it out to them whether they want it or not. It's as though Mr. Graham should take potatoes and onions to church and pass them around to the congregation! They might be very nice potatoes and onions! I know how it is, because until Hannah Eldred came and woke me up, I used to do nothing but read poetry and cook, and I know I quoted Shakespeare to the girls when they came to see me, and it made them nervous, so they didn't come often. Have you ever noticed how Polly does? She's always interested in what every one says, and she always 'catches on.' She doesn't try to run the conversation, while Dorcas—"

"Dorcas hits you over the head with a club, and then when you're stunned she sits down on you and talks to the others! Am I like her?"

Catherine laughed outright.

"That's very 'wink-ed' of you, Algernon, as Elsmere would say, but it truly does just about describe it. You never do that way yourself, but you do open up and read aloud, so to speak, in company sometimes, in a way that is disconcerting. Now, what could one say to a statement about Abyssinian trousers, for instance, when one is just peacefully walking along, going to a party?"

Algernon straightened his shoulders.

"Much obliged," he said briefly. "I've been doing a little observing on my own account lately, since I've been around with the rest of you so much, and what you tell me fits, all right. I guess I can cut out the information! I say, doesn't the Osgood place look fine?"

The great porch at the Osgoods' "palatial residence," as the Winsted Courier always faithfully referred to the house, was alight with square pink lanterns. A long strip of carpet ran out to the sidewalk, and as she stepped upon it, Catherine put her hair back with a quick gesture and smiled up at her tall companion.

"I tell you, I'm proud to make my entrance by the side of the real Librarian of the Winsted City Library."

"Leave your scarf here, Catriona darling," said Polly, greeting her guests in the doorway. "You don't need to prink. Mother, Father, here are Catherine and Algernon."

Mrs. Osgood came forward and took Catherine's hand with ceremony. Then she turned to Algernon.

"This is really an occasion. I am delighted, in my new capacity as Trustee, to salute the Founder and the Mainstay of our Library."

"O!" protested Catherine. "But isn't it perfectly lovely the way the council did take up with the idea? Was there any hitch at all about it?"

"Not the least," said Mr. Osgood. "You never saw anything smoother. You young folks certainly struck this town with this library scheme of yours at the psychological moment. The council was all for it. The tax was voted, and directors appointed as though it had been talked up for years."

"And Bertha is a trustee," cried Catherine, seeing Bertha in the group beyond. "O, Bertha dear, do use your influence to keep Algernon in office!"

Everybody laughed at that, and Mrs. Osgood threw up her hands.

"We can't help ourselves! No one can ever underbid him, except by paying for the privilege. Algernon won't take a salary."

Algernon flushed uneasily. "I haven't earned one yet," he muttered. "And besides, salaries for public positions—"

Some choice fact was refused utterance there, for Algernon, seeing Catherine's eye upon him, swallowed his harmless 'statistic' and lapsed into silence.

"Where are Bess and Archie?" fussed Polly. "Every one else is here, and we do want to begin dancing. I wonder what can have kept them."

"Here they are," called some one. "Hurry up, you two. You're the latest."

"We've brought our excuse with us," and Archie set down before Mrs. Osgood a bulky newspaper parcel. Bess, smiling mysteriously, refused to answer inquiries, and when the greetings were over Archie produced a knife and started to cut the string.

"Tell them the story first, Archie," suggested Bess.

"You think it would be more dramatic? Well, maybe so, maybe so. Ladies and Gentlemen: I have here a gift for the Winsted Public Library. It comes most appropriately on this evening, when the original supporters of that institution are celebrating their release from its responsibility! Miss Symonds," indicating Bess with a graceful curve of his thumb, "and myself were proceeding hither to join you. Our way led us past the spacious edifice dedicated now to the Cause of Learning and Recreation, having once been given over to hats, and later still, as many now present remember, to rats! The library is, as some of you are aware, not open on Wednesday evenings. Therefore we were surprised to see standing before the door in an attitude of patient expectancy, a rustic gentleman, bearing in his arm this identical parcel. We hesitated and then remarked courteously to the gentleman that there was small hope of his obtaining satisfaction at that particular portal before to-morrow afternoon. His face fell. Seeing which phenomenon, Miss Symonds," again the thumb curve, "being of a kindly nature, offered sympathy to the disappointed reader. He opened his heart to us—and also his bundle. It seems he was not there to borrow books, but to bestow blessings. The article herein contained was destined by his wife, its maker, to adorn the library's walls."

"He said," interrupted Bess, "that he was sure we didn't have anything like it, because his wife invented it, and he didn't know as there was another in the world, even. He seemed to think the library was a kind of museum and every one was sending things, and he and 'wife' wanted to, too. He was a dear old man. So clean, and he wore a red shawl around his neck this hot night—" Bess tossed her own bare head at the thought, and fanned her pretty white shoulders. "Do show it to them, Archie, and don't make fun. He really thought we would think it was lovely, and it certainly is unusual."

"Open it, open it!"

Archie dropped to one knee, cut the string, and, removing one paper after another, lifted slowly a hoop bound in red wool, from which depended twenty fat little birds made of scraps of velvet.

Silence and bewilderment. Then, "What's it for?" faltered some one.

"We must explain it," said Bess laughing. "They don't understand. Neither did we, at first. It's not for anything. It's just an ornament, a beautiful parlor ornament. And you hang it from the chandelier and set it swinging. So!" She illustrated and the gay little birds bobbed merrily up and down.

"They are hung on spiral wires of different lengths, you see, to make them more lifelike and natural."

Every one was full of delight and amusement now, and one hand after another poked the poor little birds till they bobbed to a degree dangerous to their shoe-button eyes.

"It's a variation of the Japanese wind-bell motif," said Mrs. Osgood. "But I shall wish I were not a trustee, if I must act on such problems as that."

Algernon took the hoop and put it back into its wrappings.

"I'll write and thank him," he said, "and I don't see any objection to it. The children will love it. I know Elsmere would."

"We can keep it up for a while and not hurt his feelings," said Bertha, and as Polly at the piano began to play a waltz, the boys chose partners and the porch filled with dancing couples.

It proved, however, rather warm for dancing. Polly and Winifred took turns at the piano, but before long every one was willing to sit and rest.

"Play that pretty last one again, Polly, and let us listen," begged Bess. "It's too warm to stir, but you play that so beautifully."

Polly obligingly seated herself at the piano once more in the broad open window. The light tripping music, unmarred by the sound of sliding feet, floated over the lawn and across the street and up into the Swinburne balcony. Suddenly the lazy group on the Osgood veranda caught sight of a flickering flame high in the neighboring house. Algernon started up, but Bertha restrained him.

"Watch!" she said. "It's Elsmere. I saw him."

The candle was stuck upon the railing of the balcony. Then capering about, in little white night-drawers, to the sound of the music, Elsmere danced, bare-toed, upon his well-waxed floor, the unconscious observed of all observers. Applause long and hearty rewarded his efforts, and also brought Maggie to the rescue. As she pounced upon him and knocked the sputtering candle to the ground, Peter and Perdita, splendid in starched white linen, appeared in the doorway behind "the party" and invited every one to come and draw bows and arrows.

Peter held a quiver of arrows, tied with bright ribbons "for the ladies." His sister at his side offered "the gentlemen" a fine assortment of bows, with varicolored bow-strings. Bows and arrows mated, the hunters marched in pairs to the screened-in breakfast room, looking out over the river.

At each end of the table was a chafing-dish, and in the center was a huge cabbage surmounted by two natural-looking bunnies.

Each marksman tried his luck, and the cabbage was soon riddled, but it was reserved for Bert, with Dorcas' arrow, to knock one rabbit over backward. Thereupon Bert and Dorcas were immediately swathed in great aprons and installed behind the chafing-dishes to show their skill as cooks. Fortunately both were competent, and though much hampered by advice and witticisms, by the time Peter and Perdita had passed the rabbit salad, radishes and olives interspersed with artichokes and little china bunnies, the critical moment had passed, and creamy messes were ready to be ladled forth upon wafers, and consumed in eloquent silence.

When, at last, there was nothing left but a few leathery strings, and even Archie declared his spirit alone was willing, Polly rapped on the table with the handle of a big spoon and called the meeting to order.

"Miss Smith has an announcement to make."

Everybody looked at Catherine. Her eyes were shining and her face was all aglow with pleasure.

"I'm going to have company and I want you all to know it, and come and get acquainted."

"Who is it?" asked some one.

"The rest of the Wide Awake girls."

"What?" "All of them?" "All of you together?" "Not the German one?" "Is Hannah Eldred coming?"

The girls all talked together, and the boys looked mystified.

"I wish some one would enlighten me," said Max helplessly. "Who are the Wide Awake girls?"

"Why, Max! Didn't you ever take Wide-Awake?"

"The magazine? Sure thing. What of it? Does Catherine want us to subscribe? After an ivory manicure set or a lawn-mower premium?"

"No, no. Listen, Max, and any of the rest of you who are so ignorant as not to know about the Wide Awake girls. Hannah Eldred advertised for friends once, and Catherine and a little girl in Germany and one out West answered. And the German one proved to be the daughter of a long-lost friend of Hannah's mother, and the one out West turned up at Dexter, rooming next door, when she went there, and now she rooms with Catherine. Did you ever hear such a tale in your life? If you were to read such a string of facts in a book, you wouldn't believe it."

"No more you would," commented Max. "I'm not at all sure I believe it, as it is. Are they all coming at once, Catherine?"

"Not quite. Hannah and Frieda will be here in a week or two, and Alice as soon after as she can. They are all of them the dearest girls!"

"Pretty?" asked Archie.

"Wait and see," laughed Catherine. "They'll make their own impression, but I want you all to be friends as we are."

"We'll do our best to entertain them," said Bert. "Distinguished foreigners don't come our way every day. I move you, Madam President, that we make these Wide Awake young ladies honorary members of the Club."

The motion was put and carried with a round of applause, and a few minutes later the Boat Club meeting was informally adjourned.

Algernon, reaching home at midnight, stole into his brother's room and hung the bird-hoop near his bedside. With characteristic perverseness Elsmere, a sound sleeper by day, was easily wakened at night, and, as Algernon slipped out of the room, he sat up and watched the birds bobbing in the moonlight. Presently he dropped back on his pillow, sleepily content.

"Springs!" he said, "like Algy walks."



PART TWO

THE COMING OF FRIEDA



CHAPTER EIGHT

A FORTUNATE MEETING

On the day of Polly's party, far away in the village of Ventnor on the Isle of Wight, some one was thinking of the young people of Winsted and their library undertaking.

A tall woman walked swiftly along the road toward Freshwater, enjoying its charming variety, the sudden glimpses of sea beyond the chalk cliffs, the quaint cottages and lanes, and at a certain bend the trees she loved better than all the rest, with ivy running over the ground and up the mighty trunks. There was a radiance about Clara Lyndesay which seemed to make whatever she looked upon more beautiful than it had been before. No one had ever been able to analyze it, to decide how much was due to the sunny hair, how much to the blue eyes, and the smile that suggested sweet wistful things that never could be told, and how much to her own deep inner peace. "The beauty of you certainly helps the goodness make its impression," Dr. Helen said to her once, "and yet I am half inclined to believe that it is the goodness that makes the beauty!"

Just now there was no analyst at hand, no one, in fact, but a stout small boy, driving a butcher's cart. He felt the force of the charm, however uncritically, and grabbed his cap from his head as he drew up beside the lady.

"The landlady down there asked me to give you these here, thank you!" He handed out two letters, and then clucked to his horse in an embarrassed fashion as Miss Lyndesay thanked him.

"They came after you left, and she said you'd be wanting them, thank you!" And he drove on, leaving the source of his emotion quite unconscious of him or it, intent upon opening the first of the letters.

"They are too long to read as I walk," she said, and chose a comfortable secluded spot to sit. "Let me think. It was a year ago in March that I saw Hannah first, there at Three Gables, when she had just come back from Germany, and was homesick and missed her mother so. She did Catherine as much good as Catherine did her. They are a pair of charming children, as different as April and October. I think I will save Hannah's letter for the last. It's sure to be exciting, and Catherine's should be read in a calm spirit." Accordingly she opened Catherine's and glancing with a smile over the tabulated statement of the health of the various members of the family, regularly included since her complaint that no such information was ever granted her, began to read the letter proper:

"Dearest Aunt Clara:

"Algernon is away at a district meeting. I believe that is what he calls it. He is quite elated over the opportunity and Polly and I are taking charge of the library while he is gone. I hardly see Algernon any more. He is so busy all the time, and he is simply sought after. People seem to think he is an infallible authority, now that he is librarian, and he does seem to know everything. He reads everything and has an intelligent way of telling what you want to know. I'm quite impressed by him, myself. Of course, he talks technicalities a lot, and he acts grieved sometimes because the rest of us don't take the library quite so seriously as he does. The others are rather tired of it by now, except Polly and Bertha and Agnes. I really enjoy it, and I come in often nowadays, because I know when Hannah and Frieda get here, I won't have so much time for it. The children are fond of Algernon and he remembers the funny things they say and tells them—(it's the first time he ever had anything amusing to say on any subject!)—Peter Osgood wanted The Wail of the Sandal Swag, and a little girl asked for Timothy Squst. (If that's how you spell it. It rhymed with 'crust.') The children aren't the only funny ones. A man came in this afternoon and asked for Edith Breed, and it proved he wanted He That Eateth Bread With Me, and one forlorn-looking creature handed me a slip of paper with Doan the Dark written on it, and she meant Joan of Arc!

"Later. I had to stop there to wait on a whole group. I don't understand why they always come in hordes. They don't seem to be connected at all, but there are always times when there is no one here and then suddenly an influx.

"Just now the room is empty again. I wish you could see it. It is a dear little room and now that it is being really used, doesn't have that bare look it had at first. We fixed up a darling Children's Corner, with some child pictures cut from a magazine and framed, and a little round table Polly used to have, and my own little rocker. The window is a sunny one, and the little curtains look so fresh and dainty. Almost always there is some child or other sitting there looking at pictures or reading.

"Later again. Dearest, dearest Aunt Clara! My eyes are all full of happy tears. I can't write clearly. I came home from the library a little tired and quite willing to let Polly take it for the evening. And here on the porch was the box, the blessed box, addressed to me. Of course, I wasn't too tired to open it! O, you dear darling! We have needed color in that bare little place so much, and here is this beautiful glowing picture just full of story suggestions. There never was a child born who could look at that, and not go dreaming off into all sorts of fairy tales. It makes me so happy to think you care enough about our little library to give your own beautiful work. I wanted to go right down and hang it, but I called Polly up on the 'phone and she came over, and said I should keep it this evening to look at, and we'd hang it when Algernon comes back to-morrow. She is delighted, too, and Algernon will be, and he will send you a formal letter of thanks, but nobody can be so pleased as I am, because you are my almost-truly aunt, you know.

"I do hope you can feel the thanks I'm sending you across all that big salt water!"

* * * * *

Clara Lyndesay's own eyes misted a little.

"That little study isn't deserving of such glowing words," she said to herself. "Now I must see what my other childie has to say. Their letters are growing more similar. Catherine's association with other girls is giving her a more open manner, and Hannah is growing a bit more mature. Still,—" her eyes fell upon the wild slant of the writing before her, "I suspect she never will be quite grown up, and this particular time she doesn't show the maturity alarmingly! This letter looks as excited as the one she wrote from Dexter when she was upset about sororities last year."

"Darling Lady Love of Mine:

"Are you in Ventnor still? Shall you be there the 23d? I don't know what I shall do, if you leave the Isle of Wight before the 27th. I wanted to cable, but father thought it was unnecessary and of course I couldn't afford to do it on my own account. They charge terribly for cabling. And this letter may not reach you till you are gone, or they are. O dear! It just worries me to death to think about it. And there you are so near and I have wanted you and Frieda to meet so long. You may even be passing each other on the street or somewhere and not recognizing each other. Have you seen her? You'd surely know her, if you stopped to think, for Mother always said she looks like Mona Lisa and you'd notice Mona Lisa if you saw her. Even if she did have on a sailor suit too big for her, and a funny soup-bowl hat. Only perhaps she doesn't wear such things now. It's two years since I saw her, almost, that is, and I don't know how she dresses.

"Aunt Clara! I was just going to sign my name and read this over and I haven't told you what I was writing for at all. You will think me a dreadful rattlebrain! It's just that we got a post card to-day from the Langes saying that they were on the Isle of Wight for several days, and I thought right away that you simply must meet them. It's such a little island! They wrote from Ryde. O, I'll enclose the postal. It will tell you all about where they are to be, and you will try your very hardest to see them, won't you? You couldn't help loving them, every one, dear Frau Marie and the funny Herr Professor. And nothing is far in England.

"Your loving loving Hannah."

"P. S. I wrote Frieda to look for you."

* * * * *

The blue eyes were full of laughter this time.

"Rattlebrain! I should say so. And of course,—yes, she did forget to enclose the postal. It's a wonder she didn't cable. Now here am I, exhorted to meet three German people of whom I know these facts: Professor Lange of Berlin, the Frau Professor and their daughter Frieda, who looks like Mona Lisa and—perhaps—wears sailor suits too large for her and a funny soup-bowl hat. Were in Ryde some time ago, and, I judge, expected to be on the Isle until the 27th. To-day is the 26th. Well, I'm afraid, Hannah dear, you'll have to learn to keep your head a little better, when you wish to carry out your pleasant ideas. I wonder what she wrote to Frieda."

She rose from her seat on the ivy-covered grass, and strolled leisurely back toward her hotel. The afternoon light was low and the little church she passed on her way seemed more than usually quaint and inviting. Half-way by, she turned irresolutely, then entered the churchyard.

A local guide was showing a party of tourists about.

Miss Lyndesay was turning away to avoid them, when a deep "Ach, so!" followed by a feminine "Wunderhuebsch! Ganz malerisch!" fell on her ear. She looked more closely at the little group. A gentleman in a long linen duster, with a loosely rolled umbrella under his arm, was gazing at the church most earnestly. He stepped back to get a better view, and colliding with a mossy headstone, turned and bowed to it politely with an apology. The little woman at his side paid no attention to him or to the guide, but followed with her eyes a plump young girl in a sailor-suit, who was stooping to gather flowers.

"Frieda," she called, "pluck not those blossoms!"

Miss Lyndesay approached the young girl. Mona Lisa's inscrutable eyes and elusive smile looked up from below an impossible hat.

"I was looking for you, Frieda," said Miss Lyndesay. "But Hannah said you were in Ryde."

"Yesterday, gracious lady," said Frieda, ducking in a courtesy, "but to-day, no. We have sought you, too, and vainly. Vater, Muetterchen, behold Hannah's beloved lady. We have found ourselves at last!"



CHAPTER NINE

LANDING

"O Dear! It seems as though I couldn't wait a minute longer. It takes such an eternity for them to get in. Do you think you can see her, Karl? Take the glasses and look. See if you don't think that little red speck in the bow is her?"

"After the verb 'to be'—"

"O, bother, Karl! You are fussier about my English than my German."

The tall fair young man smiled, but answered stubbornly: "It's a fact, Hannah, you are more careless about English than about German. Not in grammar only, but in pronunciation. How is a poor foreigner to guess that 'sumpn' for instance means 'something'?"

"If it didn't mean anything, I wouldn't say it," retorted Hannah saucily. "Is there any other criticism you have to make upon my use of my native tongue, Mr. Germany?"

"You drop your final 'g' occasionally, and always your final 'r'," went on the accuser.

Hannah laughed. "You can't hear an 'r' unless it's rolled over the tongue like macaroni, Karl Von Arndtheim! Just wait till you hear the western girls talk, and you'll be satisfied. Look! Look! It's as much as an inch nearer. Give me the glasses again. I do believe that's Frieda. No, not the red one, but the blue one with the veil floating. Can you see?"

Karl pushed his way through the crowd, drawing Hannah safely along into a little open space at one side. Stationing himself against a pile of boxes, he helped her climb to the top and support herself by clinging to his shoulder.

"There, child, you can sit and watch, and she'll see you better than if you were mixed up in the crowd. Put up that sunshade and wave it. She will think you are a great blue bird ready to fly out and meet her."

"I wish I were a gull. I'd fly right to her dear shoulder and peck her cheek. But are you sure I'm not too heavy, Karl? This thing is wobbly and I lean on you awfully for such a fat lady as I am."

"I can endure it! I say, Hannah, now she is so nearly here, I'm beginning to get excited myself. Die niedliche Kleine! It doesn't seem two years ago that you youngsters used to send cakes and things down to my window from yours. You were a pair of ministering angels."

"Wasn't it fun? Poor Karl! I did pity you so, cooped up in the house that way. And you played the violin like an angel yourself, like a grieving one."

"Well, we've all given up the angel hypothesis by this time, though it was useful in getting us interested in each other. There! This time I see her, not in red nor in blue, but in brown. See! She is jumping up and down and waving to us."

The moments that followed while the great vessel swung heavily into place alongside the pier, and the ropes were made fast, and the gangplank was flung across, seemed interminable to impatient Hannah. Frieda was almost the first to land, and as she stepped on shore, she found herself lifted in a mighty hug, which she returned with all the strength of two muscular arms, gasping little cries of "Ach, meine Hannah!" as she did so.

When the embracing stopped for a moment, Karl stepped forward, hat in hand, to greet Frieda in his turn. She seized his hand and wrung it, repeating: "Ach, my heart could burst for gladness. My dears! My dears! But where is Miss Lyndesay?"

"Miss Lyndesay?" cried Hannah, looking wildly about. "Not my Miss Lyndesay?" But as she spoke, some one bent down and kissed her mouth, rounded with amazement.

"Yes, your Miss Lyndesay, and Frieda's guardian for the present. We must get out of the crowd a little, Hannah, and then we can tell you all about it. Is this Mr. Von Arndtheim? I think I shall have to introduce myself. Will you find the way to our trunks, please? I had the hand luggage taken off at once. It's fortunate we both belong in L."

Somehow the little group made its way inside the great roofed-over place where the customs inspectors were doing their disagreeable duty to trunks and suitcases. Under a great black "L" Karl soon had Miss Lyndesay's and Frieda's trunks opened and passed upon, while Hannah struggled to collect her wits, and control her unspeakable rapture. Frieda was intent upon seeing that no harm was done her belongings, which were piled up about her, umbrella, hand-bags, a carryall, a shawl-strap, a brown linen roll with Gute Reise embroidered on it, and a long trunk with rounded edges. She resented the inspector's opening anything, but Miss Lyndesay and Karl ignored her protest and at last the ordeal was over, and all four were seated in a carriage, driving to the club where they were to lunch with Miss Lyndesay.



"Frieda! Frieda! Put your head back in here!" said the harassed guardian of that head, in a tone of mingled amusement and weariness. "If you get her safely to Mrs. Eldred to-night, Mr. Von Arndtheim, you will do well. Frieda has escaped various sorts of peril on the voyage, rather by miraculous intervention than by any skill of mine as chaperon. Tell me, Hannah dear, how are your family?"

Hannah had been sitting very quietly beside her beloved lady, too dazed yet to realize her unexpected good fortune. She squeezed the gloved hand hard now and answered mechanically, her eyes telling the feelings that were surging within her.

"That is good. We left Frieda's parents well, too, and quite content after some excitement. You see, they had made plans for Frieda to come with an English friend of theirs, who was obliged only a few days before sailing-time to change her plans. Then the Professor thought he might send Frieda in the captain's care, but that distressed Frau Lange, and they were on the point of giving it up altogether when they happened to tell me about it. I had been intending to come over soon, anyhow, and could easily arrange to take their friend's place, and did so gladly. It was a much more interesting passage than I have usually known!"

Miss Lyndesay smiled at Frieda and Frieda smiled in return, but had almost immediately to be drawn forcibly into the carriage by Karl.

"You can see enough of America without putting your head out," he suggested. "It is an interesting country, but not worth so much effort, I assure you."

They were driving down Commonwealth Avenue by this time, and even Frieda's Berlin had never shown her a pleasanter and more decorous street. Karl thought, as she leaned forward, that she was trying to get a better view of the trumpeting angels on the spire of the church they were passing, but he was destined to be undeceived.

"I care nothing for America," said Frieda scornfully. "But I do not trust that man. I cannot see all my Handgepaeck, only the ends of two bags. Let us stop him and count them!"

"Americans don't steal!" said Hannah hotly.

"Neither do Germans!" cried Frieda, and Karl looked at the two with consternation.

"See here, Kinder," he put in. "This is a little too much like old times. You are two years older now, and shouldn't be so belligerent."

"Bell-i-gerent?" Frieda fumbled in her coat pocket and brought out a little red book. "I do not know that word. I will seek him."

"O, dear," moaned Hannah. "Are you going around seeking words in a dictionary all the time, Frieda? I'll put a stop to that, you'd better believe."

Miss Lyndesay watched the little scene in silence. On the way across the ocean she had wondered more than once what effect Frieda's decidedly young and aggressive nature would have on Hannah, whom she knew to be easily affected by her companions.

"Catherine will have her hands full, keeping them soothed," she thought now, and was glad when the carriage stopped before the familiar house with the mail-box between the posts, and Karl helped her out.

"B-e-l-l-i-g-e-r-e-n-t!" spelled Frieda triumphantly, stumbling out of the carriage, "'Inclined to fight; war-like; pug-na-cious—' Ah!"

Her eyes fell upon the Handgepaeck. "Eins, zwei, drei, vier, fuenf,—wo denn? So! fuenf, sechs. Es sind alle hier!"

"There!" said Hannah. "I told you the man wouldn't steal!"

Frieda opened her lips to answer, but Karl caught up all the luggage he could carry and led the way to the steps where Miss Lyndesay was waiting, and the two girls followed him, forgetting national disputes in common interest in their surroundings, as they had done more than once before.

At luncheon in the pretty club dining-room, Frieda ate industriously and silently, as Hannah remembered seeing her do of old. Hannah herself did justice to the good dishes, though she could hardly take her eyes from Miss Lyndesay's beautiful face, and could think of nothing whatever to say on any subject. Karl and his hostess chatted pleasantly and liked each other warmly. After luncheon, Karl went out to send cablegrams, and Miss Lyndesay took the girls up to the attractive white and green room which had been assigned to her.

"Can't you come out home with us?" asked Hannah wistfully. "I know Mamma would love to have you. She couldn't come in to meet the boat, because we've been at the shore until two days ago, and she was getting the house open; and Dad was too busy, so they sent me down with Karl. But I know if they were here, they would beg you to come. Can't you, please?"

Miss Lyndesay took Hannah into her arms and kissed the warm red cheeks. As she did so, she saw a queer little look of annoyance cross Frieda's face, and she put out her arm and drew Frieda close, too.

"I'd like nothing better than to be with both of you for days and days. Think how I shall miss my little roommate! But I must stay in town a day or two to do some necessary shopping. You know, I am going to spend the rest of the summer in Brookmeadow, a beautiful little village, not far from your home, Hannah. I'm going to fit up a studio there, out of an old house I own. And listen, both of you! Before Frieda goes out West, you two are to come over and spend a day and night with me in my home there. Shall you like that?"

The sunshine on their faces answered her, but Hannah's grew wistful again.

"You are going to be so near my home all summer, and I'm going away, myself."

"But you are going to Winsted and Catherine. Don't forget that. And I shall be at Brookmeadow still when you come home. Hannah, Hannah, haven't you learned yet that one can't have everything that is delightful all at once?"

"I suppose you mean about sorrows making you appreciate blessings and so on," pouted Hannah. "But I don't believe it. I know I could be happy all the time, if I could have all the things I want just when I want them!"

Miss Lyndesay did not smile. "Perhaps you could!" she said slowly. "You will never have a chance to prove it. It's not within the limits of possibility. But I had an idea, Hannah, that you were one of the people who could manage pretty well to be happy with things as they came."

Hannah flushed and buried her face on Miss Lyndesay's shoulder. Frieda looked restless.

"Bitte, sprechen Sie mal Deutsch," she said suddenly. "Es tut mir furchtbar weh, immer Englisch zu hoeren!"

Quick as a flash Hannah's head came up, and she laughed a delicious laugh. "Poor Frieda," she said in German, "does it hurt you awfully to hear English all the time? There! There! I know how you feel. Did you talk German to her coming over, Miss Lyndesay?"

Miss Lyndesay looked guilty. "I'm afraid I did. You see, it was such a fine opportunity for me to practise, and I didn't want her to be homesick, as well as—"

"I was not seasick," declared Frieda stoutly, and both the others laughed.

"I have crossed the seas full many times," said Clara Lyndesay smiling, "but never have I known any one who was seasick! But to change the subject, it's almost time for Karl to be back to take you to the train, children; and Frieda has a spot on her coat which I can remove if you will open my suitcase, Hannah, and bring me the little bottle of benzine in the left-hand corner. Mrs. Eldred must not think I have brought her an untidy little Maedchen!"

They spent a cozy half hour chatting in German or English, as the spirit or their respective inabilities moved them, and when Karl arrived to escort them to the station, they were in a blithe mood, which even the ordeal of parting from Miss Lyndesay did not shake.

"You are coming very soon to visit me," she said, as she kissed them good-by, "and you are both to be good until then, and not belligerent. Remember you are children no longer."

"Aren't you a child any longer, Frieda?" asked Hannah with interest, as they entered the carriage.

"Indeed, I am not. Did you not see that I make no more Knixes?"

"That's so. Isn't it fun not to? Don't you ever forget?"

"Only once. When I met Miss Lyndesay in the churchyard," said Frieda, dwelling on the memory.

"No wonder!" said Karl. "I would salaam before her, myself."

"So would I!" agreed Hannah. "But Frieda, then, if you are no longer a child, at last you have a will?"

Frieda nodded her head emphatically.

"Now," she said, "I have a will."

And Karl, looking into her sturdy face, into the eyes which he had sometimes seen dancing with mischief, sometimes flashing anger, and sometimes brimming with sorrow, murmured a prayer under his breath, for gracious guidance for that new-claimed "will."



CHAPTER TEN

THE MAKING OF A COMPACT

At the end of the short railway journey, Mr. Eldred met the girls and conducted them to the house where Mrs. Eldred waited with a heart-warming welcome for her little guest.

It was a pretty home and Frieda felt the charm of it instantly as she went up stairs with Hannah to the little square room which she was to occupy. At the same time, however, she felt strange and out of place. She was conscious of a contrast between her own hat and Hannah's, between her heavy wool dress and Hannah's blue linen suit, between her strong, serviceable—and ugly—shoes, and Hannah's pumps, also strong and serviceable, but far from ugly. The six pieces of hand luggage and the queer steamer trunk, when deposited in the center of the little room, with its crisp ruffled curtains, and its plain mahogany furniture, disturbed the harmony that had reigned before from the etching over the bed to the bowl of ferns on the table. Hannah was friendly and beaming, and not at all belligerent. Mrs. Eldred was all sweet, cheery thoughtfulness, but Frieda looking at herself in the oval mirror of the dressing-table, felt a sudden throb of pity for the girl she saw there.

Hannah helped her remove her thick jacket, tucked it and her hat away in the closet, piled up the bags and asked for the trunk key.

"Mutter hat uns immer gesagt, alles an seinen Ort zu legen," she said in a kind of chant. Frieda looked up, her eyes brightening with fun.

"Mother always told us to gargle every morning and use plenty of tooth-powder," she said, and Hannah shrieked with glee.

"O, have you been learning English out of that ridiculous Edith and Mary book, too? I hoped you would have it, and we can do beautiful dialogues in German and English. I've always wanted to, but I never knew any one who could do the responses. I'll be Edith and you can be Mary."

Mrs. Eldred came in as Hannah flung the lid of the trunk back. Frieda's fun died away as she reached into a little pocket and took out a letter.

"It's for you, Tante Edith," she said, holding it as though she loved it. "It's from my mother—" and the tears came into her eyes as she said the word. Mrs. Eldred and Hannah exchanged glances of understanding, and Hannah caught up the water pitcher.

"I'll get this full of warm water for you," she said briskly, "and you must hurry and get ready to come down stairs, for we are going to have Kaffee just as you do in Berlin. Won't that be fun?"

"Mamma can comfort her," she thought to herself, as she emptied the pitcher which Sarah had filled a few minutes before, and refilled it with water a shade cooler. "I'll leave them alone a few minutes and go down and see about the coffee. I know she will like those little currant cakes of Sarah's."

Frieda, however, seemed little inclined to ask consolation from Mrs. Eldred. She stood helplessly looking into her trunk, and Mrs. Eldred, feeling suddenly shy, looked helplessly at her. The clouded, silent face was so different from Hannah's.

"Aren't you rather warm, dear, with that heavy gown on? Let's find something thinner to slip on before we go down stairs."

Frieda stooped, rummaged a minute, and then produced a dress of pink cotton, fussily trimmed with lace and ribbons. "This is thinner," she said, stonily.

"That will do though it is rather fine for home dinner," said Mrs. Eldred gently. "But put it on, if you will, dear. I'll tell that forgetful Hannah to bring your water at once. O, I see, she left it outside the door. There! If you want any help, just call me. I'll go into my own room across the hall and read your mother's letter." She wanted to kiss the child, but Frieda's manner forbade it.

The pink frock had alarmed Mrs. Eldred. "Clothes make such a difference to girls," she thought in distress. "How can I help her? She will be proud and shy, and sure to think I am criticising her mother's taste. Dear Marie!" Whereupon she wisely suspended her puzzling and read the letter.

"I am sending Frieda with as few new clothes as possible, my dear Edith, relying upon your taste and kindness to fit her out with what she needs. I remember how differently you dressed when you came to Heidelberg, and how odd Hannah's clothes looked to Frieda's friends, and I want Frieda to start without a handicap. American girls are less accustomed to seeing foreigners than German girls are, and a little difference in the way of dressing might make a great difference in happiness. I am afraid my Frieda will be peculiar in many ways that cannot be remedied, so once more I ask you, will you choose for her a simple outfit such as Hannah herself would approve, and make me more than ever your grateful debtor?"

Mrs. Eldred sighed with relief. The solution of one difficulty in sight, she felt braver about all others. It was a theory of hers that food and clothes were more important to happiness than most of the subtleties poets and philosophers write about. "Homesickness is very often hunger, and Weltschmerz can frequently be cured by a becoming frock, or brought on by an ill-fitting one," she meditated, as she fastened the pink and lace for Frieda.

Downstairs Hannah was busily setting forth upon a round table an appetizing array of cakes and cookies with a copper pot of coffee. Mr. Eldred had arranged to be present at this unwonted function, and Hannah chattered to him as she worked.

"Be sure you shake hands with her often, Daddy dear," she admonished him. "She is used to so very many hand-shakings a day, you know, and we mustn't cut her down to none at all, the very first thing. It's little matters like that that make you homesick. And homesickness is agony, Father. I know, for I've been through it."

Mr. Eldred pinched the plump cheek which showed no trace of past anguish, and Hannah seated herself upon his knee, being watchful of the pleats of her skirt as she did so!

"There's one good thing," she philosophized. "She can't miss her father as I should miss you, for he is so absent-minded that he really doesn't know her from the furniture. For all she is such a mischief inside, she acts so quiet-like and well-behaved around the house that she might almost as well be a sofa and done with it. And they have plenty of sofas, so he won't miss her and she won't miss him so very much, either."

"You imply that if you were better behaved, you would not miss me so much when we are separated! It's sufficiently complicated. I suppose you pine for my fearful reprimands?"

That was such a delightful joke that they both laughed aloud and Mrs. Eldred and Frieda were quite in the room before they realized it, and sprang up to greet them with cordiality, if not with the ceremony Hannah had planned for.

Those first days Frieda lived in a busy whirl. Hannah, once at home, and recovered from the excitement of the day in Boston, was ashamed of her conduct on that occasion, and tried to make up for it by all sorts of thoughtful attentions to Frieda, which, with the shade of formality they involved, added a little to the loneliness they were meant to combat. Mrs. Eldred, giving up, or suspending for a time, the apparently hopeless task of winning Frieda's confidence, attended to her wardrobe with a rapidity and fervor which astonished Frieda, accustomed to long deliberations on such matters, and no reckless buying. Even the pretty frocks and hats and shoes did not please her. She felt loyalty demanded that she should wear the things she had brought from home, and it was not till Mrs. Eldred had given her her mother's letter to read that she consented to lay aside the German garments. Mr. Eldred took her about the city, and thoroughly enjoyed her comments on things American, a scorn thinly veiled by polite phrases, or by an expressive silence.

She was silent most of the time, for the language was her greatest obstacle. She remembered vividly the superior feeling she had had in Berlin, when she had watched Mr. Eldred wrestle with a conditional or had heard Mrs. Eldred struggle to pronounce "ch." It was not nearly so pleasant to be struggling one's self, with a quite senseless "th," for instance. Her heart filled with rage when she caught Hannah listening intently to her carefully enunciated words, and then saying suddenly with relief, "O!" as their meaning dawned upon her. Frieda had been at the head of her class in English.

"It's really because you pronounce so very well," Hannah explained apologetically, on one of these occasions. "You are so much more exact than we ever think of being, that it gives an unfamiliar sound to words. And besides, yours is English English and ours is United States."

"But English English must be best," protested Frieda, and Hannah forgot Miss Lyndesay's warning and "flared up" for a minute, but immediately recollected herself, and ordered an ice-cream soda as a peace-offering, notwithstanding the fact that Frieda found the taste disagreeable.

"You'll like it, when you are used to it," she said comfortingly. "You don't have them at home, you know."

"No," growled Frieda, choking on a spoonful. "And I'm glad we don't. Sundaes aren't so bad, but the name is foolish! I do not wonder Miss Lyndesay lives most of the time in Europe!"

The fifth day matters came to a climax. Karl had come over from Cambridge to spend Sunday. Hannah and he seemed to be on the best of terms. They talked English faster than Frieda could understand, and they seemed to have an endless stock of jokes that had no meaning for her. Suddenly, after sitting with a brow like a thunder-cloud for a while, listening to them and declining to join in the fun, she started up and ran up stairs with a swift pounding gait that recalled to Hannah the way she used to tear madly off to school in the morning, fearful of being late.

Karl and Hannah, left behind, looked solemnly at each other. Karl whistled.

"Die Kleine is irritated about something," he remarked.

"I don't wonder," said Hannah sympathizingly. "I always remember when it's too late to do any differently. She felt left out, I suppose, and you know you do use a terrible amount of slang, nowadays. I'm awfully ashamed of us, Karl!"

Karl pondered a moment. Then he said: "I'll fix it up all right. Here, you take this note up to Frieda. Just shove it under the door, if she won't let you in."

He wrote a few lines on a card and gave it to Hannah, who promptly ran away up stairs with it. Then Karl went into the study and telephoned a garage.

In a few minutes, Frieda, shy and somewhat red-eyed, came down stairs. Hannah was nowhere to be seen, and Mrs. Eldred was out for the afternoon. At the door was a snorting automobile, with seats for just two.

"I knew Hannah would forgive us if we ran away by our two selves," said Karl in German, meeting Frieda in the hall, and conducting her out to the machine. "She knows enough about being in a foreign country to understand that sometimes you want to be with your very own people. There! I'll have this thing running like a charm in about a minute. Sure you're not afraid to go out alone with me? I've learned a good deal about this kind of thing lately. It's one of the courses I'm taking at Harvard. Here we go!" And there they went, speeding down the street at a rate that made a policeman, half asleep on the corner, look about him with a start. Frieda's eyes shone, and she began to feel better.

Karl had evidently acquitted himself well in his course in motoring. He drove skilfully and easily, and they were soon outside the city in a pleasant country road. Almost any place would have seemed pleasant to Frieda just then, though, for Karl was talking cheerily, merrily, talking in German, talking of topics she knew about, and talking exclusively to her. She discovered that the day was much more of a day than she had thought. There was a quality in the air she had not noticed earlier in the afternoon. Presently she even became confidential. Karl, with eyes and hands busy, guiding the machine, bent an attentive ear as Frieda poured out her suppressed irritation of days.

"They think it is such a fine country, Karl. I cannot understand them. If they had never travelled—but they have been over Europe! They have been in Berlin! And still they find matter for admiration in this dirty little city with its buildings all heights, and its no trees anywhere except in the parks. Where are their beautiful statues? Where is their Victory Avenue? Where are their bridges? Ach! It is a poor cheap country. Tante Edith and Mr. Eldred are heavenly kind, and Hannah I have loved with a great love, but they have very little taste, and no sense at all."

Karl puckered up his lips in a low whistle, and Frieda blushed.

"I did not mean to say that, Karl," she said penitently. "I am their guest. They are heavenly kind, yes. But I do not like the country."

It was a beautiful shady road they had come into then, and the hills at the end of it showed gracious curves.

"This reminds me," said Karl meditatively, "of a place I went through near the Rhine one summer vacation. It's really quite as charming, I believe. Look here, Frieda. I'm interested in the impression you make in this country. You're going to spend this year with a lot of girls who don't know much about Germany or Germans, and I don't mind telling you that I'm rather anxious to have you do us credit."

"I shall do Germany credit, everywhere," answered Frieda stoutly, but somewhat perturbed.

"I'd like to think that," answered Karl, "and on the whole I guess it's true, but if you keep on this way, I'm not so sure of it. You are sitting here this afternoon making general statements about America when you have seen only one of the less important cities. That doesn't strike me as the way one should judge. It doesn't seem like the kind of thing Professor Lange would do. He is very accurate and careful in his judgments. And next, you haven't shown much enthusiasm over the things the Eldreds have done for you the last day or two. Now, I never knew any one who was so unfailingly appreciative as Frau Professor Lange."

Frieda pouted. "But Hannah shows off."

"Shows off? Frieda, I'm afraid your sense of humor is rather one-sided. Hannah may take advantage of your not understanding perfectly, but who taught her that that sort of thing was funny? Who told her the brass plate over the barber's door meant that cakes were for sale there, so that she almost went in to buy one?"

Frieda chuckled. "It was not long I could fool her. She soon learned too much. Besides, my mother would not let me."

"You still think it was justifiable and humorous, I notice. But what would you have said if Hannah had told you to say: 'So am I' when strangers said: 'I am glad to meet you'? That was what some one told me, when I first began talking English."

"If Hannah should tell me wrong, I would tell her what I think of her!" blazed Frieda. "But you need not lecture any more, Karl. I understand, and I will be good. I will be better than Hannah. I will be better than yourself, than the saints, even. I will admire all things. Behold the ravishing country! The wonder of that sky! Not Italy, not Spain has such a dull gray color! The beauty of the dirty streets! The charm of the crowded street-cars! Only five cents a ride, sitting upon the laps of others! I will no longer sew on Sunday. I will never ask for beer. I will eat every morning little dry cushions of curled grain. I will rock madly. I will—"

"Hold on, Frieda!" shouted Karl. "Don't reform so fast. I can't keep within speaking distance of you. You know, the reason I scolded you so hard was because I sometimes feel just as you do about the whole country!"

Frieda put out her hand. "Let us make a compact. For the honor of Germany, we will be scrupulously careful of what we say about America, but sometimes, all by ourselves, we can say just what we feel like saying." Karl took her hand solemnly. "It's a bargain, and you are a Cor-r-rker-r-r!"



CHAPTER ELEVEN

BROOKMEADOW

Clara Lyndesay stood in the doorway of her Brookmeadow house, listening for the coming trolley. As she waited, she looked about her with satisfaction.

The big square house, freshly painted white, with green blinds at the windows, stood just at the edge of the broad elm-shaded road, known as the Albany Road because it had been, in stage-coach days, the main line between Albany and Boston. Just opposite the house was a broad meadow with a single elm in the center, and a clear line of hills for background. Boulder walls enclosed the meadow, and vines ran riot over them. The artist, looking, drew a deep breath.

"'The lot is fallen unto me in a fair ground. Yea, I have a goodly heritage,'" she thought to herself. "I think I shall call my wander-years over, and settle down here as Aunt Abigail hoped I would, and care for her old mahogany as she did, painting a picture now and then from my own doorway. The doorway itself is the most beautiful thing about the house," she added, stepping down the flagged path, to view it for the hundredth time that week. Brookmeadow houses were famous for their wonderful old doorways, with carved lintels, and this was not surpassed by any of them.

Its owner's contemplation was cut short by the far-off whir of the trolley, sounding clearly through the still morning. Miss Lyndesay walked quickly along the curving road to the Common where she was to receive her guests. Reaching the long narrow green, where a few cows nibbled placidly as in the days when a green in the center of the village was a necessary defensive measure, she walked idly up and down. The straggling road under the great elms passed the plain white meeting-house, dating from 1813, the Academy with its belfry, the little general store and post-office combined, and wound out of sight between dignified old houses, "like Aunt Abigail's—mine now," she corrected her thought happily. No one was in sight. Up the road came the trolley, jogging comfortably along. It stopped at the Common and its two passengers almost fell into the arms that waited to receive them.

"O-eeeeee!" sighed Hannah, getting as close to Miss Lyndesay as she could on one side, while Frieda did the same on the other with a similar ejaculation.

"Two blue girls this time!" exclaimed Miss Lyndesay. "That is a very becoming suit, Frieda," and then forestalling any answer, for she had known of Frau Lange's letter to Mrs. Eldred and had guessed that Frieda would not take altogether kindly to the new clothes, she inquired of Hannah as to the health of her father and mother.

"They're all right," answered Hannah briefly. "And I am so glad to be here! Isn't it just the dearest, sleepiest place you ever saw in all your life?"

"Is it your first visit here?" asked Miss Lyndesay. "I supposed you knew these villages by heart."

"I don't," confessed Hannah. "I go to school all winter, and in the summer we go to the shore, and we haven't any aunts or grandmothers or things like that living around here, so I don't see places like this except in passing through them."

"Well, you have a sort of aunt and grandmother combined living in Brookmeadow now, and I shall expect you to visit her often. How does it seem to you, Frieda?"

"It's bigger than I thought it would be," answered Frieda. "Hannah said it was a Dorf. I thought there would be only two or three houses, and many little huts all close together, but we passed many houses."

"It is a good thing for you to see a New England village," said Miss Lyndesay, "as part of the education you came for. And when you get out to Wisconsin, you will think you are in a different country altogether."

"I did," laughed Hannah. "Why, it looked as though it had been laid out with a ruler, and the trees were so little I felt as though they ought to be in flower-pots."

"Not the beech woods, surely?"

"Dear me, no. But in the town itself. The beech woods are real forest. Is this the house? O, Aunt Clara, wouldn't Catherine love it?"

Miss Lyndesay was so unused to the house, herself, that she took a keen delight in showing the girls all over it, taking them from one big room into another, and telling them how to appreciate the fine old furniture.

"The hangings are all new," she explained. "Aunt Abigail's taste was not like her heart! She kept the old furniture, but she had gaudy wall-papers and thick lace curtains, and I have had them all replaced. They aren't done yet, everywhere, but these main rooms are. And she had the fireplace bricked up and a stove in the living-room. I found these andirons in the garret."

"O, let's see the garret," begged Hannah. "We haven't any, with old things in it, I mean. You know our house is only a little older than I am, and mother came from the West and she didn't have heirlooms, and father had nothing whatever when they started. I should think this house would have been full of treasures."

"It was. I found several good chairs and a desk in the garret. I shall have them refinished as soon as I can get around to it. There is a trunk that I have only peeped into. I saved it for you girls to open. But you must come out into the garden now, while the sun is there."

Frieda had taken only a moderate interest in the house, but when they entered the tangled garden, German exclamations poured from her lips in a rapturous stream.

"Himmlisch! Reizend! Famos! Ach, wie wunderhuebsch! Was nennt man dies? Und dies?" She flew from one blossom to another, sniffing, admiring, and asking questions about those that were unknown to her, naming the others in German, and altogether showing a degree of enthusiasm which nothing American had hitherto been able to arouse in her. It was not because of Karl's compact, but because of her mighty love of flowers. She seemed to forget the others as she knelt before a little white tea-rose, kissing it and calling it pretty names.

Miss Lyndesay and Hannah watched her.

"Now she seems more like herself," said Hannah frowning, "the way she was in Berlin. I wish she would stay that way!"

Miss Lyndesay looked at Hannah searchingly.

"Frieda," she called, "will you gather flowers for the luncheon table, please? Hannah is going to pick raspberries with me. I have a most beautiful old glass bowl to put them in."

Frieda undertook the task assigned her joyfully, and Hannah followed Miss Lyndesay to the kitchen, where Aunt Abigail's old servant, inherited with the house, supplied them with pails for the berry-picking. The bushes were at the other end of the garden, where they could speak without being overheard.

Miss Lyndesay said nothing at first, but she had not long to wait. Hannah had poured out her puzzles and worries in letters to this friend often, since the evening at Three Gables, long ago, when she had poured them out in words and tears, and found comfort.

It was a torrent of words this time, but Miss Lyndesay, listening, distinguished between essentials and non-essentials by a divine gift which had always been hers.

"She doesn't seem the same Frieda," declared Hannah, at last. "I don't feel acquainted with her. Mamma says it is just because everything is new and strange to her. She hasn't criticised things since she and Karl went off together for a little trip the other day, but she looks bored or unhappy and I don't know what to do. I was a stranger when we were together before, but I'm sure I didn't act so, and I don't see why she should now. So there!"

"Did you go to Germany alone?" Miss Lyndesay put the question casually, and Hannah looked up, surprised.

"Why, no. Dad and Mamma were there all the time, of course. I couldn't have lived without them—O! I see what you mean," and the berries dropped slowly into the half-full pail while Hannah meditated.

Clara Lyndesay, observing her bent face, felt satisfied. It was not the first time she had seen Hannah Eldred come out of a quandary with very little help.

"She doesn't do things by halves, either," she thought. "Frieda won't have such a lonely time from now on." Aloud she said:

"I wondered, when I heard you speak to Frieda in that careful explanatory way, as you might to a child who had been left in your care rather against your will, if you seemed just natural to Frieda! Frau Lange realized that there was some risk in sending Frieda over here. She told me that she knew young girls changed rapidly in tastes and ideals, and it might be that you two would not care so much for each other now. But she hoped, for the sake of the friendship between your mother and herself, that the two years would prove not to have separated you greatly. I assured her that, while there might be some little difficulty at first, you would probably come out better friends than ever. There! I think we have quite enough berries. If you will just take them in to Evangeline, I'll see about Frieda's flowers. You'll find a pitcher of shrub on the ice, and goblets on the tray all ready to bring out. We'll arrange the flowers on the back stoop, I think, and you might bring us some refreshment there."

Frieda had gathered flowers eagerly, but without much discrimination. Miss Lyndesay helped her sort them and make several bouquets instead of one variegated one, talking with her the while of incidents of their journey, till Frieda was entirely at her ease. By the time Hannah came out with the cool drink, the slight constraint that had existed for days between Frieda and herself seemed to have vanished. Joyfully, Hannah entered into the new spirit, and when Miss Lyndesay went in to answer Evangeline's questions about luncheon, her guests were bubbling with mirth over some reminiscence of their Berlin days.

Immediately after luncheon, a caller arrived, with the obvious intention of spending some time. Miss Lyndesay gave the girls a trunk key and sent them off to do their garret exploring by themselves, giving them permission to do whatever they liked with anything they might find. They climbed the polished stairs, with arms interlaced, chattering in German and English mixed, and reached the big shadowy garret out of breath. The trunks were piled in a cobwebby corner, and their key proved to belong to the lowest one in the pile. That meant much mighty tugging, but at last the encumbering ones were removed and they turned the key in the lock and lifted the heavy lid.

"O!" They spoke softly and leaned over, clinging to each other with excitement. In the top tray lay a doll dressed as if for a wedding. She wore a white satin gown, short-waisted, with a long panel down the front, embroidered with tiny pearls and gold thread. Her little feet were adorned with high-heeled slippers of white silk, also embroidered in the tiny pearls. A necklace of shining stones, and two little earrings made them gasp with delight. In the soft wavy hair was a high shell comb. The little lady held a book in her clasped hands, and her eyes, half closed, looked sleepily out from under long eyelashes.

"See! Here is a card," said Frieda, touching the soft folds of yellowed tissue paper that lay around the little figure in the tray.

Hannah lifted the card with awe, and read: "The doll of Millicent Wadsworth, as she dressed it on her own Wedding Day, to be put aside and never played with more. The Bishop said it was a sinful Waste to dress her so, but my Husband said he did not care!"

"What a reckless man My Husband was!" said Hannah, looking back at the doll once more. "Think of playing with dolls up to your wedding day! I wonder how old she was."

"Let's look in the other trays," suggested Frieda. They removed the top one carefully, to find almost as delightful treasures in the next. Quite as delightful, perhaps, for here was the little Millicent's wedding-gown, with her slippers and necklace and high shell comb, all like those the doll wore. Here, too, was a card, but written in an older hand:

"The Wedding Clothes of Millicent Wadsworth Berryfield, married on the 16th anniversary of her birth to John Berryfield, Esq., a Devoted Lover and Husband. She died three months and two days after of an Unknown Malady. John Berryfield returned to England, leaving these, Her Possessions, to be kept sacredly till he should come after them."

"It's dated almost a hundred years ago. Of course, he is dead too, now. I wonder if she pined for her doll to play with."

Frieda, leaving speculation to Hannah, was taking the pretty garments out, one by one.

"Here is another dress!" she exclaimed. "A pink one. O, Hannah, you would look so pretty in this!" She held it up, quaint in style as the other, with a little train, flowered silk over a straight front panel of plain pink, tight sleeves with a little puff at the shoulder.

"I wonder—Do you suppose we dare try them on? They look almost big enough."

"Of course, we dare. Miss Lyndesay told us to do what we liked and she had peeped into this trunk, so she knew what was in it. We will be as careful as careful can be."

They piled their arms with the delicate old fabrics and carried them down to their own room where they proceeded to dress up. It was not an easy process, for they dared not tug too hard, and Millicent had been slenderer than they, though quite as tall. The little slippers defied them, and the necklace of pearls they did not touch. "I think her husband gave her that, and no one else should ever wear it," said Hannah, and Frieda agreed.

By the time they had finished dressing, they were flushed and rosy. They stole out into the hall and peered over the banisters to see if the caller showed signs of departure. Miss Lyndesay was just closing the door upon her. As she turned back, she heard steps on the stairs and, looking up, saw a sight she loved always afterward to remember. Two little Old World ladies, one in white and brocade, the other in flowered pink satin, came down the winding stairs, their eyes bright with excitement, their hair rough, and the big blue hair-ribbons, which they had quite forgotten to remove, showing incongruously above their minuet gowns.

"O you pretty children!" cried Miss Lyndesay. "Millicent herself wasn't sweeter, I'm sure, when the Bishop married her off to John. Why didn't you bring the doll?"

"We were afraid we'd drop her," said Hannah, stepping to the floor. "There! I'm glad I'm safely down. You can't think what awkward skirts these are to walk in. O!"

For as she turned, Frieda stepped on her train, and with shrieks both fell to the floor, splitting their hundred-year-old seams.

Miss Lyndesay helped them up, laughing at their rueful faces, and kissing away the tears that would come at the sight of the havoc they had wrought.

"Cheer up, dear hearts! It was purest accident. And Millicent's pretty gowns have served their purposes long ago. I've no doubt they can be put together again well enough, and in any case you must not care! I forbid it. Come, let's get back into our own century, and take a walk before the sun goes down. I have no end of pretty by-paths to show you."

That evening, there was enough chill in the air for a small fire in the living-room fireplace, and Miss Lyndesay seated herself before it on a high-backed settle, with a girl on either side of her.

"If I didn't remember that one of the things Hannah liked me for first was my habit of sitting quietly without work," she said, "I should be tempted to improve these minutes by finishing the carving design I am making to go over the fireplace."

"What is it? Let us see it, and maybe we'll let you. You have such a peaceful way of working you don't make me nervous as some people do."

"It is there on the desk."

Hannah brought the brown paper, and she and Frieda bent over it together.

"L-a-e," spelled Hannah, but Frieda looked up, delighted.

"I know. Laetus sorte mea! It means 'Happy in my lot!' It is in the book Tante Edith sent me for my birthday, about the little cripple."

"O, yes, The Story of a Short Life. I've read that, too," said Hannah, "but I didn't recognize it just at first. I should think, if it is to be your motto, you'd have to change the gender and make it 'laeta,' Aunt Clara."

Miss Lyndesay laughed. "I'm glad you both know the story. I expected Hannah to, but hardly Frieda. Did you read it all by yourself, dear?"

"Yes," answered Frieda proudly. "I have read seven English books, and I like that best. Mother and I made a list of Poor Things the way Leonard did."

"O, how nice!" cried Hannah. "Did you put Bertha's lame sister on it?"

"Yes, and Onkel Heinrich's brother who can not see and is always cheerful, and the little woman who sells string and roses in the shop under us, and Edna Helm who had to stop school and go to work because her father couldn't afford to take care of her."

"Poor Edna!" said Hannah. "I liked her best of all your friends. I'm going to start a Poor Things book myself, when I get home."

"Have you ever heard of the Guild of Brave Poor Things in England?" asked Miss Lyndesay, and as the girls showed their interest she went on to tell them of the organization which took its name and its motive from Mrs. Ewing's little story, and has grown into a large organization with industrial schools and shops.

"So all these people, boys and men and women and girls who cannot work in factories, because of some infirmity, are enabled to make beautiful things and to sell them. I bought some of their doll furniture when I was last in London. Let me see. Yes, it was in the box I unpacked yesterday."

"Let me get it," begged Frieda, and as soon as she had been told where to look she was off. She came quickly back again bringing a doll's white-wood bed, strong and well-made as the fine old furniture which had outlived Aunt Abigail and her parents.

"It is just right for Millicent's doll," cried Frieda, as she brought it in. "Couldn't we put her in it, Tante Clara, to make up for having torn the pretty dresses?"

"Indeed you may. I had no one in mind to give it to, but bought it because I had enjoyed visiting the school at Chailey."

"Can all the cripples make pretty things like this?" asked Hannah, wondering, as Frieda placed the bed in her hands.

"O, no, only a very few. But the Guild of Brave Poor Things does many other things, besides establishing the schools. All maimed persons may belong, and the guild makes investigations, finds out if they can be helped by surgery, and, if not, tries to make their lives happier in every possible way. Of course, those of them who can use their hands are happier doing so than they could be in any other way. Every Friday afternoon, from three to six, they meet in the settlement rooms and have music and games and reading, and hear talks on interesting subjects by ladies and gentlemen who are glad to tell them of their particular lines of work. Then they have a short service of prayer—"

"Do they sing the tug-of-war hymn?" asked Hannah eagerly. "I remember about that better than anything else in the book."

"Yes, they almost always sing that. I heard them, myself," and Miss Lyndesay's eyes grew sweeter at the thought. "I have never heard anything more affecting than that singing:

"'Who best can drink His cup of woe, Triumphant over pain, Who patient bears His cross below, He follows in His train.'"

Frieda and Hannah were still as she finished speaking, and all three sat looking at the fire for a few moments in silence. Presently Hannah said softly:

"And they have 'Laetus sorte mea' for a motto? I can see how you could take it, Aunt Clara, for of course you have everything anybody could want. You are well and beautiful and good, and have money and talent and friends."

Miss Lyndesay was silent and Hannah, who had been studying the flames reflectively, looked up presently to see why she made no reply. There was a grave expression on her face, and Hannah's grew startled.

Miss Lyndesay, seeing the look of alarm in the child's eyes, smiled and took her hand.

"Would you give up your father and mother for any or all of those things, Hannah dear?" she said.

"O!" cried Hannah in a hurt frightened tone, and Frieda suddenly choked back a sob.

Miss Lyndesay lifted her head quickly.

"Girls, do you realize the absurdity of us? Here we started out discussing: 'Happy in my lot' and in a few minutes we have grown sad with the burden of sorrow of half the world and our own individual troubles besides! That is anything but wise, isn't it? I didn't intend to preach to you when I invited you to Brookmeadow. But since we are on the subject, let's say a little more and then drop it. I do want you to remember that while the people who seem fortunate often have something to bear that offsets most of the pleasant circumstances of their lives, at the same time, many people who seem to have nothing to be glad about are persistently and genuinely joyful. The sad folk meet sadness everywhere, and the glad folk find gladness. Let me read you something, written by Sister Grace, who founded the order of Brave Poor Things about the time you girls were born, and then I refuse to say or hear another solemn word this evening!"

She took up a little pamphlet and read aloud:

"To bear pain cheerfully, to take defeat nobly, to be constant and loyal, to be brave and happy with the odds dead against us, to be full of sympathy and tenderness—these are gifts which mark out the truly great."

"Now let's put Millicent's doll to bed," suggested Frieda, who disliked solemnity and saw that Hannah was still staring into the fire. Miss Lyndesay seconded the motion, and, taking candles, the three mounted into the garret, sought out the old trunk and brought the beautiful doll down stairs. There, by the fire, they laid her gently down on a soft blanket in the pretty bed which was exactly the right size.

Then Evangeline appeared with a corn-popper and a sack of corn, and the half-hour before bedtime passed quickly and merrily away.

When Aunt Clara had tucked her guests into the big four-poster, they cuddled close to each other, forgetting the friction of the last few days in present comfort, sleepily grateful for the glimpse they had had that day of difficulties and griefs much greater than any of their own, and each resolving to be happy in her lot.



CHAPTER TWELVE

ARRIVAL AT WINSTED

Mr. and Mrs. Eldred turned away from the station, from which the through Chicago train had just pulled out, carrying with it two passengers for Winsted, Wisconsin.

"Well, I'm glad that's over," said Mrs. Eldred aloud. "I always feel sorry for Hannah when she has to say good-by. She does suffer so over it, but she recovers quickly."

"She seems to be acquiring a comfortable philosophy," remarked Mr. Eldred, as he looked at his watch and then up the street where his car was not in sight. "She told me that the world was fixed wrong, because it ought to be possible to be with all of one's beloveds at the same time. 'But,' she added sagely, 'that's probably Heaven.'"

"'Earth being so good, would Heaven seem best?'" quoted Hannah's mother, smiling. "We have all had to stay our hearts with that thought, I suppose. I am much more content about both girls, since Karl and Miss Lyndesay took them in hand. For a few days I really feared that the adjustment might be too much for them. But Karl worked some magic spell over Frieda, and Miss Lyndesay charmed Hannah. I must go over to Brookmeadow this very week, and pay my respects to that remarkable woman."

"Some mothers would be jealous of such an outside influence," suggested Mr. Eldred, glancing fondly at his pretty little wife.

"Then they are very unwise," declared that lady decisively. "I remember my own girlhood well enough to know that there were certain crises through which my mother could not help me as well as an outsider, simply because she was my mother. I'm not in the least afraid that any one could be dearer to Hannah than I am, and she is such a bundle of contradictions, of sweet impulses and rebelliousness, that I'm heartily glad of all the help I can get in bringing her up. There's my car. Do try to come home to luncheon. I'll be missing my lively children and their German-English patois!"

The two girls on the train had settled themselves cosily with the aid of a porter rendered over-zealous by Mr. Eldred's generosity, and were watching the flying scenery and the other passengers with interest. Frieda was not eager to arrive at her journey's end. She already missed Karl and the friendly Eldreds, who had seemed nearer her own parents than any one else in this strange country could. The prospect before her was not wholly pleasant. Hannah had spent so much energy in singing the praises of Dexter College, Alice Prescott and Catherine Smith, that Frieda's desire to see them was distinctly modified by a jealous feeling that such perfections must be somewhat tiresome. She was much more interested in watching a bride and groom across the aisle, and in making comments on American trains, some of which, according to her compact with Karl, she kept to herself, meaning to unburden her mind in the first letter she should write him. Others of a favorable sort she made aloud to Hannah, who received them graciously, on behalf of the nation. The day wore away not unpleasantly, but when the gas was lighted and the bride frankly rested her head upon the bridegroom's shoulder, a mighty homesickness swept over Frieda. She could barely choke down her food in the dining-car, and hated a waiter for watching her with a white-toothed smile. The porter was making up berths when they returned and the proceeding scandalized her, accustomed as she was to the decency of compartment trains.

Forgetting her promise, she spoke her disgust:

"Ladies and gentlemen like pots of marmalade on shelves in a cupboard!"

Hannah only laughed and scrambled up to the top shelf with the agility of a squirrel, leaving Frieda to solitude and unsuspected misery.

The porter and the grinning waiter would not be forgotten. Their blackness combined with the close warm atmosphere to alarm her. She dared not undress, and when she tried to lie down, she felt as though she should choke. The darkness seemed to her sleepy but resisting mind to be taking on human shape. With her eyes closed she saw it develop pink fingernails and gleaming teeth and eyeballs. Her real distrust of anything foreign was made keener by her homesickness. At last she fell into an uneasy sleep, clutching her purse and her gold beads tightly. At each station she woke with a jerk and a horrible conviction that the train had been wrecked and she was the sole survivor. Sometimes she put her hand up and felt of the wooden wall over her head for assurance that the upper berth to which Hannah had blithely committed herself had not treacherously closed. There were subdued rustlings in the aisle now and then, and quick brushings past her curtains which made her sit up, gasping, her eyes staring into the dark and her heart thumping. Frieda Lange crawled out of her tumbled berth next morning, certain that life could have in store for her nothing more hideous than her first night in an American sleeping-car.

Hannah, on the other hand, having "slept like a top, the way you ought to in an upper berth," as she said with a gleeful laugh, and having made her toilet with the lucky ease which seemed one of her characteristics, was full of good spirits, and joyous anticipations. Winsted seemed very near, and her bubbling joy over the prospect of seeing Catherine added to Frieda's gloom. They went into the dining-car to breakfast, where Frieda was so unfortunate as to be shot from her seat as the train dashed around a curve, a glass of milk following her, anointing her hair and face in a manner calculated to ruffle the serenest temper. Hannah and the too friendly waiter helped her up with an effort at self-control, but Frieda had mislaid her sense of humor.

The change of cars in Chicago was accomplished simply, Hannah thoroughly enjoying leading the way and Frieda sulkily following. It would have taken more than a fit of sulks on Frieda's part to have quenched Hannah's joy in life that day, however, and she rattled on of the pleasures coming, scarcely noticing Frieda's failure to respond.

"Winsted!"

Hannah was out of the car almost before it stopped. Frieda, delayed by other passengers who pushed in ahead of her, saw the rapturous meeting between her own Hannah and a tall sweet-faced girl with red-gold hair, whose beauty she was obliged to admit, though she did so gloomily. "I hoped she would be homely," she growled to herself as she stepped down to the platform, and suffered Catherine to kiss her cheek.

"Let's walk," suggested Catherine. "It's much too beautiful a day to be cooped in a bus. I'll have your bags sent up. O, Hannah, my darling, I've been waiting ages for you! And for you, too, Frieda," she added shyly.

But Frieda was regarding the wrinkled pleats in her dress, and was conscious that her hair was still wet with milk; therefore she only mumbled something and stalked along beside the others who, in their delight at seeing each other, quickly forgot her, and chattered away in English, with many little bursts of laughter.

Dr. Helen was out when they reached the pretty house on the hillside. Catherine led Frieda to the big rose guest-chamber, and then carried Hannah off across the wide hall to her own room and the little dressing-room opening from it, which Hannah had occupied on her first visit a year and a half before. The trunks arrived at once, and Hannah immediately began to unpack, Catherine sitting on the edge of the bed and exclaiming over every new frock as it came out. Frieda, left alone, because she had only partly understood the invitation the others gave her to join them, and had wilfully refused the part she had understood, was wretched indeed. She sat stiffly on a straight mahogany chair, and wished with all her might that she had never been born, or at least, if that mistake had been inevitable, that she had never left her native land.

Suddenly there came a quick tap at the door and Hannah, not waiting for a "Come," ran in and tossed a parcel into her lap.

"What? Aren't you dressed yet? Do hurry. Karl asked me to give you this as soon as we got here. Did Catherine show you your bath-room? You have one all to yourself; isn't that lovely? It's the most beautiful house, anyway. O, what dear roses on the dressing-table! Wasn't it just like Catherine to put them there? Hurry up. Dr. Helen will be here pretty soon, and Polly Osgood and Dot Winthrop are coming over to see us. I'd put on that white poplin skirt and the waist with the blue butterfly bow at your throat. You look awfully fetching in that. Yes, Catherine, I'm coming," and she flew out, tossing a kiss to Frieda.