"But we miss the old country sometimes," said the grandfather. "Our neighbors and the pleasant evenings and the bands."

"Don't you know the other Germans here?" asked Frieda. "Dr. Harlow tells me there are many."

"They are not from our part of Germany," said the little grandmother gently. "And they are Methodists, while we are Lutherans."

"But our sons come often to see us, and we have the garden and each other," said the grandfather cheerfully. "And sometimes we get hold of a German book or paper."

"O!" cried Frieda delightedly. "There will be many German books for you soon," and she told them eagerly about the library and the list of books Algernon had already ordered at her suggestion. They listened with intelligent interest, and exchanged looks of pleasure at the thought of such a storehouse to draw on in the long winter evenings, "when the garden takes its nap," as the little Frau said lovingly.

The sun was perceptibly lower when Frieda rose to go. Then she remembered Dr. Helen's errand. The faces of her host and hostess shone at the name. "Heavenly kind! Yes! She had done much for them. They would send her flowers gladly, but sell them to her? Never!"

With big shears they cut great stalks of everything the garden contained, and, piling Frieda's arms with blossoms, while she uttered protests and exclamations of delight, they escorted her to the gate. There, in spite of her boasted emancipation from childhood, she dropped a courtesy and left them, crying "Ade!" as long as they could see her.

At the supper table at Three Gables, Dr. Helen, with Bert on one side, and Archie on the other, called on each girl in turn for her story of the afternoon.

Alice's turn came last.

"It was such a beautiful prescription!" she said. "I went to see Madam Kittredge. Her daughter took me up to her big room furnished with old mahogany heirlooms that made me feel as though I were in New England. And there in an arm-chair sat the most beautiful white-haired woman I ever saw. She is quite imposing and grand, but her smile saves her from being awesome. I loved her at first sight, and was not shy about staying alone with her. You would hardly know she is blind, would you? And she is perfectly delightful. She asked about Mrs. Langdon, and told me some droll stories of her odd ways, even when she was a young girl. She and Mrs. Langdon and another girl were together a great deal when they were young, and now they live within a radius of a hundred miles, but she says they never travel, so it might almost as well be a thousand. One is blind and one is lame and the third is deaf! She laughed about it as though it were not sad at all. The deaf one has been quite ill recently, and Madam Kittredge is making the prettiest present for her. She says Mrs. Langdon writes regular letters to them both, but Madam Kittredge can reply only by dictation, or by sending little gifts, and she takes the greatest pleasure in doing that. She showed me what she was getting ready for 'Matty,' as she calls the one who lives in Milwaukee. It seemed so queer to hear her speak of Mrs. Langdon as 'Sue'! If you should see her once,—" turning to Bert, who sat beside her,—"you would appreciate it. She is almost a fierce-looking old lady, and she says the most startlingly frank things if she chooses. I don't believe any ordinary person could help being a little afraid of Mrs. Langdon, but Madam Kittredge seems to think her a delicious joke. But I started to tell about the present. You see, this Matty is all alone in the world. She never married and she hasn't much money, and she just loves pretty things, especially pretty colors. And so Madam Kittredge is sending her a rainbow basket. It ought to have seemed pathetic to see her handling the colored things and hear her telling about the pleasure she was sure her friend would take in them, when she couldn't see them herself, but somehow it wasn't. She doesn't seem to think of herself at all, and so she doesn't make other people. She said she made excellent use of her sight while she had it, and can picture everything clearly now. The basket itself was beautiful, a big green sweet-grass scrap basket, with a great green bow. And inside were six parcels, each tied with a bow of ribbon, so that all the rainbow shades are there. The friend is to draw one each day for a week. Mrs. Kittredge undid them and let me look. She says she likes the feel of the soft paper and ribbon. First was a little red rose bush in a pot—"

"Is she going to send the thing that way? How can she?"

"I asked, myself, and she smiled and said she allowed herself some extravagances, and one was to carry out her little ideas like that without minding if they did cost rather more doing it her way. She said her friend would enjoy the rose ten times as much coming that way as she would if it were ordered from a Milwaukee florist, so she's sending it. I like her independent spirit!"

"It might take an independent fortune as well," remarked Dr. Harlow, "but Madam Kittredge is fortunate enough to have that, or its equivalent, and she uses a good proportion of it in conventional charities, so she is safe from criticism if she chooses to assist the express companies. Perhaps she's a stockholder in one, for all I know! What did she have for orange, Alice?"

"A box of tangerines, with those tiny, tiny ones like doll oranges; I forget what you call them. They looked so pretty in a nest of green. The yellow parcel was a little sunset picture, only a little colored photograph, she said, but with a charming glow. The basket itself was for the green stripe in the rainbow, and there was a lovely pale blue knitted scarf, which Madam Kittredge made herself. The indigo bothered her, but she sent her daughter searching everywhere till she found a beautiful Persian pattern ribbon with an indigo ground, and she made that up into sachets with violet scent."

"That finished off two at once," said Hannah. "If I were Matty, I'd object. I thought you said there were six parcels."

"One of the sachets was done up with dark blue ribbon and the other with violet. But there was still another parcel, a white one, the prettiest of all, for it held skeins of all the soft shades of embroidery silk you ever saw in a white silk case. I don't see how any one could help liking to look at them. Madam Kittredge said that what suggested the whole idea to her was Matty's writing about how she enjoyed having colored silk samples to look at, as she lay in bed. She does embroidery, too, when she is well enough, so she will like the silks to use, by and by."

"What a charming basket!" Catherine drew a deep breath of pleasure. "I should love to see it."

"She said she shouldn't send it for a day or two, so if you go in to-morrow, you can. I'm sure she'd love to have you. She wanted one more thing to make it complete. You see, without intending it, she had put in something for every sense but hearing. There was color and fragrance and touch and taste, and she said she wanted to get some music into it, and she couldn't think how. Of course her friend is deaf, but that didn't matter. She said her mind's ear was as true as ever, and she wanted her to hear something out of that basket. And wasn't it lovely! I happened to think of something which she said would do exactly!"

"What?" "Tell us!" "Think of having a hand in such a pretty present!" The other girls leaned forward eagerly, and the boys looked almost as interested. Alice went on a trifle shyly, as she came to tell her own part.

"I suggested some little poem full of color words, and that delighted her and she thought a minute. I didn't know any, and I wished Catherine were there with her headful! But Madam Kittredge has a headful of her own. She had me get out two or three books and look up some that she thought might do, but they didn't just suit her; and then she had me open her clipping book and hunt for one called Indian Summer. It was just the thing and I loved it the minute I read it. She let me copy it for her, and make an illuminated initial with her water-colors. She seems to have everything imaginable in that big roomy desk of hers. I was glad of the chance to copy it, for I could learn it and I want to keep it always."

"Please recite it for us," said Dr. Helen, and, the others all joining in her request with words or looks, Alice repeated the beautiful lines lovingly:

"Faint blue the distant hills before, Yellow the harvest lands behind; Wayfarers we upon the path The thistledown goes out to find.

"On naked branch and empty nest, The woodland's blended gold and red, Dim glory lies which autumn shares With faces of the newly dead.

"Tender this moment of the year To eyes that seek and feet that roam; It is the lifting of the latch, A footstep on the flags of home.

"Now may the peace of withered grass And goldenrod abide with you; Abide with me—for what is death? Pall of a leaf against the blue."

Feeling that a benediction had been pronounced, they all adjourned to the porch, Dr. Harlow sitting down by Archie and chatting with him in a friendly way about his own Andover experiences years before, while the girls talked quietly with Bert, who had dropped his nonsense for the time. Dr. Helen was sitting a little apart, but by and by Hannah slipped over to her chair.

"I'm not so very clever about things," she said, "and I always like to have them explained. So won't you tell me just what you meant by this afternoon? You know we all promised to use the prescription again, if we needed it."

"Yes," said Dr. Helen encouragingly, and waited.

"Well. You might have meant several things. You might just have meant that we needed a change. We had been sitting about and wishing it was cooler and talking nonsense and gossip—almost!—and we hadn't been doing anything useful. Perhaps you wanted us to find out that we'd be happier if we did something for some one else, even if it looked disagreeable at first. I've always had that preached to me!"

"I didn't preach!" objected Dr. Helen.

"No, you prescribed. That's your way of preaching, though. You set us to preaching to ourselves, and it's much more objectionable. I can shut my ears when other people preach to me, but I can't get away from myself! But I was wondering if, perhaps, besides all that, you didn't want us to see how cheerful and happy some people manage to be without much to make them so. Even that little girl with the spine plays she is an enchanted princess, Catherine says, and has lovely times, winding balls of yarn and cutting paper chains. She has to get a certain number of them done before the enchantment will be broken. I know who suggested that idea to her," said Hannah, looking searchingly into the doctor's face. "I've found out a lot of things this afternoon about you, professionally. Perhaps that was what you were after! Just advertising!"

Dr. Helen's laugh at this brought Dr. Harlow over to her; and Archie joined the other group.

"Go on, Hannah," said Dr. Helen, seeing Hannah hesitate a little. "Dr. Harlow will be interested in your analysis of my prescription."

"I wasn't going to analyse it any more, but I was just thinking that whichever you meant, they were really all of them the same thing Miss Lyndesay meant when she talked to us about being laetus, I mean, laetae sorte mea, I mean nostra!"

Dr. Harlow chuckled softly, but Dr. Helen put a kiss on the sweet mouth with the earnest curve.

"When you finish school, Hannah," suggested Dr. Harlow, "you can come out here and help us in the office, making up prescriptions for spiritually afflicted folk—we've all got to take up that line nowadays, you know—and handling the Latin end of the business. Helen never was strong on Latin. She translated 'E pluribus unum' as 'One too many' when she was young!"

The boys got up to leave, and the doctor's raillery was checked, but Hannah pondered over it as she went up to bed. About midnight she heard him closing the doors for the night, and, slipping her bright kimono over her night-dress, she stole out into the hall and half-way down stairs.

"Dr. Harlow," she called softly, and the doctor looked up to see her leaning over the banister, her curly brown braids falling forward.

"I know now why you laughed," she said. "It should be sortibus. Laetae sortibus nostra! O, dear no, nostris. I guess I'd rather do the surgery, and let you attend to the Latin!"

"Perhaps it would be wise!" said Dr. Harlow.



CHAPTER NINETEEN

JOURNALISM

"I'm glad you're all here. I'm in the deuce of a mess, and I want to be helped out."

So speaking, Max seated himself upon a porch settee and waited for expressions of sympathy and curiosity from the girls before him. When he had received them, he deigned to give a few details.

"You know, I'm to be editor of the college paper next year, and Morse has promised me all summer that when he went away for two weeks' vacation, he'd let me take his place. Well, he went last week and I got out the Courier. It was a good number, too. I don't suppose any of you noticed the difference?"

"I remember hearing father say the editorial was especially good," said Catherine.

"And I heard Mrs. Tracy bewailing the fact when I went in to see her yesterday, that the paper had lost all its spice, and there wasn't a single ridiculous item in it, not even a funny typographical mistake, so I'm sure you ought to feel complimented," said Hannah.

"It's true enough, but that's just where my pickle comes in," said Max gloomily. "I didn't tell any one about it, because I wanted to carry it through without any one's knowing. But the reporter has struck, because I blue-pencilled his notes. He says no college boy is going to tamper with his work, and he's just calmly left; and what's worse, his brother has withdrawn an 'ad' which means quite a loss for Morse. I see now why Morse let so many things go by!"

"That is a pity!" said Catherine sympathetically, while the others declared themselves in stronger terms. Max looked gratified. "Now what I want of you girls is to help me gather up news and make the next paper better than any issue has been since that young puppy came on it. And I'll get 'ads' enough to offset the brother's withdrawal, and a new subscription if I have to pay for it myself. I want to leave things in at least as good shape as I found them. Jenkins will come back again as soon as Morse does. He loves to write his wild stuff, and is only willing to stop for a week, because he feels important, acting insulted. Probably thought I'd eat humble pie and raise his salary, too. Why, he had the Ortmeyer-Rawlins wedding fixed out with a scare-head THE WAY OF ALL FLESH! And started it out with a quotation from Shakespeare or somebody about Love looking with the mind, not with the eyes! The bride and all her male relatives would have been down at the office with sticks. She's a pretty girl, you know!"

"It would have been worse, if she hadn't been," said Alice. "What else did you cut out? It sounds like my pupils' work. I'll help you blue-pencil. It's just my line."

"The other things weren't funny, just poor constructions and general flatness, personals that were too personal, you know, and that sort of thing. But he had a rhapsody on Dawn all worked up that he wanted to run in, this week. It began: 'When I arise at daybreak, a thousand quotations surge into my mind!' The fellow is daft on quoting. He sits with his feet on the desk and reads Bartlett by the hour. Well, I'm rid of him, and I'm looking for substitutes."

"I'd like nothing better than reporting," said Hannah. "I'll interview the prominent strangers who come to town and get their views on things. Imagine me strutting around the hotel lobby, getting acquainted!" And Hannah assumed the swaggering manner which she fancied characteristic of reporters.

"The only prominent stranger in town is Frieda," laughed Max. "You'll have to get her opinion of American education or the tariff."

"That's easy. I know all Frieda's opinions. If they are favorable, she gives them out plainly, and if they aren't she keeps still, so it's no work to guess at them. I wish I could do like she does!" she added, with a sudden earnest tone in her voice.

"I'll blue-pencil all your reportings, if you use such grammar as 'like she does!'" said Alice sternly.

"Then I'll get mad and resign as Jenkins did!" answered Hannah. "I guess I know the privileges of a reporter!"

"Do you think you could get the news?" asked Max. "I suppose I could manage alone, but I'd like to have the paper fuller and better than ever, and I thought if you girls would go in, we could have a lark out of it, and not tell the rest."

"Indeed we can get news!" cried Catherine. "If you let us tell Mother and Father, they can give us news which will be perfectly legitimate, and Hannah and I have some calls to make. Frieda doesn't want to go, and Alice wasn't here when these girls called. They are some of the gossippy kind, and we'll let them talk and report as much as seems fair. And the Three B's meet here this week, and we can make a good society column thing of that."

"Why not have Algernon give you library notes?" suggested Alice.

"He does, always, but he would be glad to do something extra, I'm sure," said Max. "I don't know but it would be a good plan to take him in on this. He's in a position to gather news easily."

"I don't see how I can help," said Frieda, sadly.

"If you'll tell me something interesting about German schools," said Alice, "I'll write it up, and that will go in as our contribution. You could make room for it, couldn't you, Mr. Editor?"

"Indeed, I could. I'd be mighty glad to get it. It would be better than filling up with poetry, the way they often do. By the way, I did cut out a poem of the reporter's. I forgot all about that. Wonder where it is," and he began searching in his pockets.

"That's what made him angry," cried Catherine. "Anybody would be angry at that. Was it a very bad poem?"

"I can't remember much of it. Only it had a refrain every two inches of 'My woe! My woe!'

'I cannot tell the world my woe,'

was the way it began, and then he went straight ahead to try to do that very thing. Here! I've got a scrap of it.

'Things are seldom what they seem, Nor is Life what its livers dream, My woe, my woe!'"

The audience shouted with laughter, but Catherine looked sympathetic.

"Poor boy!" she said. "He probably loved his quotations and his poetry, and had looked forward to Mr. Morse's being away to have a beautiful time with the paper. I don't blame him for resigning and eating his heart out. Not a poem of mine will I send you, Mr. Penfield, or any of your hard-hearted staff. I'll confine myself to finding out what's happening in Winsted, and leave the head-lines to your own inventive genius."

Two days later, the editorial staff of the Courier had an impromptu meeting in the library. Max had come in to ask Algernon for notes, and Catherine and Hannah were waiting for Frieda and Alice to join them to go to a tea at Dot's.

"We've called on the biggest gossips we could find," called Hannah cheerfully, as Max came in, "and I've got at least ten items." She showed a note-book which slipped inside her card-case.

"She was dreadful!" said Catherine. "She would stop and make notes before we had got a block away from the house, for fear she would forget, and asked questions that made me hold my breath."

"Well," Hannah defended herself. "I wanted details. I don't want just little bare sentences. And Catherine was just as bad. She took such an interest in the new people who had moved in next door to the Galleghers', that I know the Gallegher girls were almost scandalized."

Max ran his eye over Hannah's list of news items approvingly. "That's a fine start. Can't you do some more calls?"

Catherine shook her head. "No, we don't know any more of the very gossippy kind, but we are going to a tea at Dot's, and we'll make a society note of that. How are the editorials coming?"

Max made a wry face. "I declare, I'm pretty nearly stumped. At college there always seemed to be a lot of vital matters to discuss. But here there isn't anything after a little spiel on the crops and a paragraph on politics. I don't dare go in heavy there, for I'm not sure just what Morse's position is, and don't want to commit him. I can't think of any public enterprise to work up, or any nuisance to be suppressed."

"I wish you'd suppress mosquitoes and flies," said Hannah, brushing away one of the latter insects, and petting a swollen place on her wrist.

"Why not write an editorial on it?" suggested Catherine. "You can give him material to read, can't you, Algernon?"

Algernon came over to the corner where the three were talking in tones fitting a library.

"What's that? O, indeed, yes," and the boy's face lightened with pleasure as he found some one really desiring information of a worthy nature. "I'll get you something right away. There was an article in a last month's magazine."

"I could do elegant head-lines," said Max:

"KEROSENE THE KONQUEROR! MOSQUITOES MASSACRED! THE FLIGHT OF THE FLY!"

As Algernon brought the magazine and a book, Alice and Frieda arrived in their party raiment, and, bidding the boys good-by, the four girls drifted out and down the street looking like pretty butterflies.

Max lingered for a few minutes' chat with Algernon about the paper, telling him some of his difficulties and desires. Algernon's store of information proved of value here, too, and Max accepted gratefully a hint or two about the mechanical part of the work.

"I say, Swinburne," he said suddenly, as he got up to go, taking fly and mosquito literature with him, "couldn't you get off and run up to Madison for a few days this fall? I'd like to show you around and have you meet some of the fellows. If I were you, I'd try to pass off a few subjects. You could, without half trying, and perhaps you'd be able to get up and take your degree some time."

"Thanks," said Algernon, "I'll think about it," and Max went whistling away; but Algernon, as he selected a fairy tale for the little Hamilton girl, felt his heart light and his courage high. "I'll get to college yet, as true as I'm alive," he said aloud, and the little Hamilton girl looked up at him. "What did you say?" she asked. "I don't want true stories, but fairy ones."



CHAPTER TWENTY

THE THREE R'S

The meeting of the Three R's the next evening was one of particular importance. Not only to the eager reporters, who found that even Dot's party would not spread out sufficiently to use up the space they had allotted to social events, but to the club members themselves. It was Judge Arthur's fiftieth birthday, and as he was a childless man, quite alone in the world, his friendly neighbors were determined to make the day memorable for him. The meeting was to be at Three Gables, so the journalists were behind the scenes from the start. The only difficulty in the way of their writing it up was that they were so busy all day that there was not time to take a pen in hand.

"I always see to the refreshments when they meet here," said Catherine to her three helpers, as she appeared, wearing by Hannah's request, her brown smock. "You can crack the nuts for the salad if you will, Frieda; and Hannah, if you and Alice will get the dishes out of the way, that would be the most help. Mother wants Inga to sweep the living-room, and we can have a jolly time out here."

"You ought to see the kitchen at Frieda's house," said Hannah, as she made a fine suds in the rinsing pan and poured it over the glasses. "What did you think of our black stoves and things, Frieda?"

"I saw one in the American church first, you know."

Hannah smiled at the diplomatic evasion. "You are the nicest thing I ever saw, Frieda. You don't say anything unfavorable of anything any more. When I was at your house I kept criticising the whole country. But you are so polite,—as polite as Karl!"

Frieda looked pleased, but she only said sedately: "We were children when you were in Berlin, Hannah. Now it is proper for us to act like grown-ups."

"You were awfully grown-up in that pillow fight last night!"

Instantly the mask of primness vanished from Frieda's face, and roguish twinkles showed themselves.

"Don't let me ever catch you turning prig, Frieda Lange," advised Hannah. "And now don't ask me what a prig is, for I don't know in German, and there's no way here to find out. What else are you going to have for eats, Catherine?"

Catherine shuddered. "I suppose you'd think I was a prig if I told you how I hate that word 'eats,' so I won't tell you! The chief thing to-night is the birthday cake, of course. And Inga is going to make grape-fruit sherbet. It's so nice with a little tang of tartness to it, you know. And we'll have olive sandwiches with the salad and coffee. You can all help with those!"

"It's such fun to help," said Alice. "At home there are so many of us, and no maid at all, you know, and we have awfully jolly times, really. Mother is cook and she has a different scullery-maid for each meal. And the rest of us divide up the rooms, and so on. The boys are great workers, too. Even little Jack brings in kindlings and wipes the silver. He plays the knives are men, and the forks their wives and the spoons the little children."

"O, so did I, always," cried Catherine. "And it used to worry me dreadfully not to know positively that the proper couples were together. Once I tied them all neatly with different colored silks, but Mother didn't approve. Through with the nuts so soon, Frieda? Then you can begin on the sandwiches."

"Ach! The butter is too difficult!"

"Cream it, then. So!" and Alice illustrated. "I'll go to work on these, too, while Hannah puts away the dishes, for I don't know where they belong."

"All right," said Catherine. "But please don't talk, any of you, for a few minutes. I don't want to lose a word that any of you say, and I'm afraid the cake may suffer."

Dr. Helen stopped at the door and looked in at the group of silent workers. They all threw her kisses, and she went smiling on her way.

"I wish I had four of my own," she thought to herself. "How the other mothers must be missing them! Four more interesting and delightful girls I never have known. Hannah has grown more mature since I saw her last, and Frieda is distinctly unique. Alice is the kind you can tie to. But I really think, without prejudice, my Catherine is a shade sweeter and steadier and more responsible than all the rest!"

By five o'clock the house was all ready. The decorations were great masses of goldenrod which Bert and Polly had gathered. Frieda had suggested tying them with bows of red ribbon, whereat the others had shrieked with horror and tried to Americanize her color sense a little. She approved of the birthday cake, and was interested in the big tin circle which held fifty candle-sockets, and would slip over the cake as it rested on a tray. Winding this circle with smilax proved a task just to Frieda's mind, and she worked at it with Hannah's help, while Alice and Catherine planned the "recreation" for the evening.

"I'm so glad," said Catherine, stretching a little, "that we don't have to get the Rest ready for them. Refreshments and Recreation are enough to provide!"

"You need the Rest yourself," said Hannah. "I think it was a shame that out-of-town call had to come for your mother this afternoon. She would have enjoyed these things, and she looked so tired."

"I know. But I'm so glad she could go away and feel sure I'd carry things through. You don't know what a comfort that is to me! Whenever I feel discouraged about things, I always pluck up spirit by remembering that I'm really useful to her. I couldn't practise medicine myself, you know, but there have been lots of things Mother couldn't have done, if I hadn't been here to help at home. I wish she could be here this afternoon, though, for she is so clever at foolishnesses like this."

"You're clever enough at it, yourself," growled Hannah. "I don't see how you can do it. You and Alice make me sick with envy. You can cook and manage and tutor and make rhymes and everything, and I can't do much of anything!"

"How about playing the violin?" suggested Alice.

"I can't do that," said Frieda suddenly. "I cannot do one thing. O, there comes Dr. Helen, after all! We were wishing you were here," and Frieda sprang up and ran to meet the doctor. The others followed her and in an instant Dr. Helen found her arms full of welcoming girls.

"I met a messenger on the way, telling me that I need not come, and I'll admit it was a relief. I knew you'd get on all right, but I did want a finger in the pie. There! You may put my hat and coat away, Hannah, if you will, and I'll get right to work. How prettily you are putting that smilax on, Frieda!"

"That's right to cheer Frieda up, Mother," said Catherine. "She was just saying that she couldn't do anything."

"Frieda was saying that? I thought you embroidered that wonderful apron yourself?"

"O, of course, but that is only Handarbeit," said Frieda.

"Hand work is highly valued these days," remarked the doctor. "If you could teach Catherine to sew so well, Frieda, I should be even prouder of her than I am now. But it must not distress you when you find that there is some one thing you can't do. No one does everything well. It's one of my pet theories that for every talent one has, there is some other he hasn't. It's part of the balancing of the world. Think how very disagreeable it would be if there were one person who could do everything, and some one else who could do nothing at all."

"Don't you think there are some people who can't do anything?" asked Alice.

"Not really. Some people never seem to find their special line. I've known people so perverse they wouldn't do what they could, simply because they would have preferred something else. But I'm a firm believer that every one has a gift."

"Is Handarbeit a gift?" asked Frieda, looking with respect at the graceful vine twining over the shoulder of her blue apron.

"Indeed it is," said Dr. Helen. "And it is a gift more widely distributed than everybody knows. If you can, do help Catherine to discover that it is one of hers!"

"She helped me find out that I liked to sew," said Hannah. "I hated the sight of a needle before I went to Germany. But I didn't know you hated sewing, Catherine."

"I don't," Catherine answered tranquilly. "But there are always so many other things to do, and there is so much to read. It makes me shiver to think that I have only three years more at Dexter, and I haven't begun to read all I want to. I'd like to move over to the library and stay there."

"That's a serious criticism of your college life, Catherine," said Dr. Helen.

Hannah giggled. "I suppose there is a library at Dexter, but I was there a whole term, and never went inside it once!"

Everybody laughed. "Well," said Dr. Helen, "that was the other extreme. But I suppose if you young people were all-wise and learned, there'd be no point in sending you to college at all. And the world would be much more monotonous if it were filled with grown-ups! What a conflagration those red candles will make, Frieda!"

Catherine had left her seat and gone across the room to the poetry section of the bookcase, and was now turning the pages of a small green book.

"Listen to this Singing Leaf, Mother!

"'The wisest finding that I have Is very young, no doubt, Yet many a man must needs grow old Before he finds it out.

"'How happily it comes about— And I was never told!— That we must all be young awhile Before we can be old!'"

Dr. Helen laughed. "That is certainly very appropriate, and a good close to our rather sermonizing talk. I suppose fifty-year-old birthday parties should lead one to serious thinking! But now show me how far your nonsense rhyming has progressed. It's nearly supper time."

* * * * *

The Three R's were early comers and late stayers. Before the summer twilight was over, they had gathered in force. Alice, counting, suddenly said:

"Why, there are just forty-nine. Wouldn't it be fun if just one more should come?"

"Who isn't here?" asked some one. "Perhaps there will be one other, though almost everybody has come."

"The Judge himself isn't here yet," said Dr. Harlow. "He'll make the fiftieth. There he is! Let's line up, and give him a royal welcome!"

The suggestion "took," and the little judge came up the walk, bowing on all sides, and smiling. As he reached the door and shook hands with Dr. Harlow and Dr. Helen, he looked about him peeringly. "Where's my girl?" he asked.

"Here I am," said Catherine, "and here is a little souvenir for you, Judge Arthur, with wishes for many returns of the day." She presented with a flourish, a huge feather duster adorned with a great green bow. That was the signal and the others at once produced parcels of all sizes and shapes, and bestowed them upon the judge, who opened them under a rapid fire of friendly wit.

The special form of recreation offered for the evening was called "Strange Compounds." Catherine had taken the idea from the nonsense verses which had been spreading over the country as generally as the limericks of a few years before. The guests grouped themselves at little tables, and some, with shears and pages cut from old natural histories, geographies or poultry and live stock journals, created grotesque illustrations for the verses descriptive of the hippopotamustang and the kangarooster and other strange beasts which Catherine and Alice concocted during the afternoon. Others labored over historical combinations and the deeds of Bathrobespierre were sung in limpid strains, and the plaintive history of Old Black Joan of Archaeology set every one off into a gale of mirth. The Three R's had done so many foolish things together in the many years since their beginning as a club, that they were ready to laugh before a joke was thought of, and in that atmosphere of appreciation the frailest wit was bound to flourish. Mrs. Osgood headed a party of gardeners whose attempts at grafting produced such startling results as cro-custards and gerani-umbrellas. When some one requested help in developing the theme of a disaster, Judge Arthur shouted from the animal table that he had attempted to draw a wild-cat-astrophe and the picture would probably do for both!

Just in time to save them all from mental collapse, the white-gowned maidens brought in the dainty salad, sandwiches and cups of fragrant coffee. Then the noble birthday cake, wreathed in scarlet flame, was set before the judge, the candles blown out with good wishes, and the cake cut and served with the ice.

Dr. Harlow rose to announce that the prize for the most complete compound was given to Mr. Kittredge, who had conceived of a "pigeon-toad, with a lovely long dove-tail, and a pot-pied waistcoat ringed and streaked, and a sweet dove-cot-ton veil." Frieda and Hannah came solemnly into the room, bearing a crate, from the top of which appeared the head of a rooster, with a big bow of ribbon around its neck. They set it down before the minister amid the shouts of the assembled company.

"You may crow as much as you like, Sir," said the doctor, "but this fellow will beat you." And straightway, as though primed for his part, the rooster opened his mouth and filled the room with a long and lusty cock-a-doodle-doo!

"I was so afraid they would hear him before we brought him in," said Frieda to the girls, as the four gathered on the window-seat. "He kept growing and growing out there!" and then she looked bewildered at the others' sudden mirth. Her peculiarities of pronunciation were so few that the girls could never learn to expect them, and this, added to the other nonsense of the evening, was too much for even Catherine's self-control.

"I never saw grown-up people do such funny things," said Hannah, in order to cover their laughter. "Do they always act this way, Catherine?"

"O, no, indeed. I never saw them put in a whole evening quite so foolishly before. I didn't know whether they would take the idea up or not, but Judge Arthur loves to laugh, and lately mother said they had had quite stupid commonplace meetings,—cards and talking politics and literary and musical programs,—and she wanted something entirely different. They're a lot of dears, anyway! The younger set wouldn't think of laughing so hard and being so hilarious, even the Boat Club; and you should see the formal dignified parties that the Galleghers and those girls give! They go in carriages and the dancing doesn't begin till nine, though every one has a six o'clock supper and almost goes to sleep waiting for it to be stylishly late to go. Max and Archie and Bess and Win always go, and sometimes the rest of us get in, but we hardly feel acquainted with each other when we meet in such surroundings. Polly's mother told her she ought to entertain that crowd a while ago, because she was 'indebted,' and she planned a luncheon party, and at the last minute changed her mind and got up a Boat Club picnic instead. That was the last picnic before you girls came."

"I've heard so much about those jolly picnics," said Hannah, "and we haven't been to one!"

"I know. Isn't it odd that it happens so? But we'll have one the night before we go back to college. The moon will be full, and the boys have all the plans made. There! They're beginning to leave." And Catherine went forward to help her mother's guests find hats and scarfs.

"I never heard Catherine talk so much at once before," said Frieda lazily. "She looks beautiful to-night, too,—to boot!" She had just heard that phrase and though a little uncertain as to its exact significance, took pleasure in inserting it here and there in her speech.

"She's a darling dear," assented Alice, "and so is Dr. Helen, to boot! Now let's help Inga clear things away and go to bed."

A half-hour later, Frieda and Alice in the guest-room were sound asleep, and Hannah in her little bed was sleeping likewise. But Catherine was sitting by the window writing, by moon and candle light, notes for the Courier, due to appear to-morrow, and still lacking at least two columns! She wrote slowly and conscientiously, trying to be clear and simple, and yet not so unlike the usual style of the Courier as to excite comment. Presently she finished and, resting her elbows on the window-sill, looked out into the night. Capella twinkled at her and she leaned out to identify such of her beloved constellations as she could.

The house stood high on a hillside, and overlooked the streets of the little town. Suddenly through the trees Catherine saw the gleam of a moving lantern, then another and a third. She heard a voice call, and an answer from a distance.

"I wonder what it means?" she thought, watching and listening. "It sounds and looks very mysterious. The Courier!"

The recently acquired news instinct recognized in this mystery of voices and moving lights at the dead of night a possible "scoop" for her paper. To be sure, her paper was the only one in Winsted, but that did not matter. She got up, and taking a long light cloak from the closet threw it over her shoulders, drawing the silk hood over her head. Then she stole out into the corridor and down the stairs, her party skirts rustling, and the boards now and then creaking under her stockinged feet. Down stairs she stopped, put on her pumps, and then let herself out, closing the door softly behind her.

Outside everything was very still. Catherine felt a little frightened and foolish. But having started, she would not turn back. Resolutely she went down the walk in the direction in which she had seen the lights.

"I might take Hotspur, though," she thought, and turned back toward his house under the porch. The big dog sprang up to meet her, and leaped upon her, then drew her toward his kennel. Puzzled, Catherine followed him, and once there, knelt down and looked inside. Curled on the straw inside the roomy doghouse were two little figures. She pulled at them and called. Suddenly one sat up and said: "Mamma! Peter!"

"Perdita Osgood! what are you doing here?" and Catherine drew a sleepy dishevelled-looking little girl out and into her arms. Perdita blinked and woke entirely.

"Elsmere and me went journeying," she said, "and we stayed all night in Hotspur's house, so bears wouldn't get us."

Then Catherine remembered the other slumberer, and dragged Elsmere out with more force than gentleness.

"I see now what the lights and the calling were," she said. "They discovered that the children were not at home, and were out looking for them. Poor Polly and poor Algernon! Elsmere, wake up here, and come along home this minute. There, Perdita, I'll carry you, you sleepy, naughty little girl. Elsmere, come along. Give me your hand."

Down the hill they went, and through the short cut to the Osgood house, Elsmere running beside Catherine, who walked as rapidly as though Perdita had no weight, Hotspur leaping and bounding alongside.

In the path, through a little grove, they saw a twinkling lantern and Catherine called:

"Polly, Algernon! They're here! I'm bringing them home." With a rush the lantern-bearers were upon her, and Perdita was taken from her arms into Mr. Osgood's, while Algernon, husky and faint with relief, picked up his brother and listened to Catherine's story. She followed the others to the Osgoods', where Polly and Mrs. Osgood were waiting in suspense. Perdita had been put to bed as usual, but when Mrs. Osgood came home from the Three R's party she had gone in to tuck the children up, and kiss them good night. Perdita was not there, and they searched the house before they thought of being alarmed. Not finding her anywhere, they had roused Peter and questioned him. He could only say: "I say, 'Perdita, Perdita, stay home with Peter. Elsmere bad boy.'"

That suggested Elsmere, and investigation showed that, though he had not been missed at home, he was not there. Then the men had taken lanterns, and gone out to search.

No one was more distressed than Peter. "I'd ought to tooken care of Perdita better," he would sob. "I'd ought to watched her better."

"There, there, boy," Catherine and Polly soothed him. "You did your best, and she's home now, all safe, and won't go journeying again, ever. She didn't like Hotspur's house, and she will stay home with Peter."

"O, Catherine," sighed Polly. "You are an only child, and you don't know what agonies you can have over your brothers and sisters. It seems to me ever since Peter and Perdita were born I've been worrying about one or both of them!"

"Poor Polly!" said Catherine sympathetically. "But I don't suppose you'd give me your share in them, would you?"

Polly caught Peter close, and hugged him till he protested and drew away from her.

"Kiss me," she begged.

"I did," said Peter.

"Kiss me again."

"I did twice," said Peter. "I want to go to bed. Aw-ful sleepy!" and, with a yawn that set the others to imitating him, he stumbled off toward the stairs, in his little night clothes. Polly followed to make him comfortable, while Mr. Osgood took Catherine home.

"You did us a great service to-night, my dear," he said, as he lifted his hat to say good night, when she had reached her home porch. "But I haven't learned yet how you happened to find them."

"I was out reporting for the Courier," she told him and then, laughing softly at his astonished expression, explained her meaning. "And though I did find out the news, I can't write it up," she sighed. "I know how real journalists feel when they have to sacrifice a scoop for reasons of delicacy."

"The Courier shall not suffer!" said Mr. Osgood. "Since it was for its sake that you went out, I'll have to see that Max gets a little assistance. My profession doesn't advertise, but I have some influence with one or two concerns that do, and I'll see that your next number is full of something more profitable to the management than harrowing accounts of midnight searches for missing babies!"



CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THE LAST PARTY

Rain.

Rain.

Rain.

"It's beastly," said Alice, with her nose pressed to the window-pane, watching the cold drifting downpour.

"Let's go in and see if the others are awake."

So Frieda put on her heavy leather slippers, lined with figured satin and edged with fur, and a very bunchy bathrobe, and followed Alice's kimonoed figure across the wide corridor to Catherine's room.

They pushed the door softly open and entered.

Then they exchanged glances of mischief. Dr. Helen did not believe in girls sleeping two in a bed, but Alice had found the big mahogany bed in the guest-room lonely, and Frieda had found the cot narrow; so they had made a law for themselves and slept together; and here, in Catherine's four-poster, were also two heads, one auburn and one brown.

"Wake up, you two!" said Alice, tickling Hannah's plump cheek, while Frieda tweaked the pink bow from Catherine's bronze braids.

"Time to take off your pink bow, dear. It's daylight and it looks worse than goldenrod with red ribbon."

"Ouch! You needn't have given that last yank. I'm awake. Hannah!"

Hannah sighed and turned over. "Don't bother me," she said. "I didn't get to sleep last night until this morning."

"Why aren't you in your own room and bed?" asked Frieda severely.

"I'll wager you two slept together, yourselves," said Catherine. "O, Hannah, do wake up! It's raining!"

"Yes, that's what we came to tell you," said Alice. "We've just been watching it wash away our beautiful moonlight picnic."

Hannah sat up and looked out.

"Isn't it beastly?" she remarked.

"I should call it foul," said Catherine, beginning to comb out her great braids.

"Why not fish-ous?" suggested Alice mischievously, whereupon Hannah pitched a pillow at her.

"Ow! Look out for my glasses!"

"Well, don't make such flat puns then. I believe you sleep with your glasses on. How funny they must look staring away in the dark. There goes the rising-bell. I'll beat every one of you to breakfast."

Dr. Helen was not sorry to see the rain. An all afternoon picnic, with the evening and a late-rising moon added, did not seem to her a wise plan for the day before going back to college,—"though I do dislike putting a damper on your pleasure," she said at breakfast.

"There's a damper on this one," sighed Catherine. "Alice has not been up the river yet, and the other girls haven't been to one real Boat Club picnic. Mother!" and an inspired look came into Catherine's eyes, "why couldn't we have our picnic in the library instead? It would be as appropriate a way to end this summer as on the river, and this is one of the closed evenings. Don't you think we could?"

The other girls held their breath with eagerness, while Dr. Helen considered.

"I don't see any objection," she said presently. "I suppose that would be more fun than having them all come here?"

"O, heaps more," cried Hannah. "It would be the jolliest kind of a lark."

"Would the Board be willing?" suggested Alice.

"I'm sure of that," said Catherine. "Algernon will be the hardest to persuade, for he feels as though the library were almost holy ground, but I'll interview him at once."

The telephone was kept busy for the next half-hour; by its means everything was arranged, and every one notified, and the girls went to work making preparations for the supper. Polly and Dot came over in the afternoon and the time slipped quickly by, trunk-packing and sandwich-making being mingled in what seemed to the doctor, some of the time, an almost hopeless jumble. At last the sounds of talk and laughter and running up and down stairs ceased. The boys had arrived to carry baskets, and a rain-coated procession tramped gayly off, waving good-bys now and then to the two doctors standing in the window.

"It hardly seems as though Catherine could be the same girl," said her father. "She is so eager and full of fun."

"But she keeps her quaint sweet dignity all the same," answered Dr. Helen softly. "She will never lose her characteristic charm, and it is such a comfort to have her well enough to wish to eat a cold supper in that bare little room!"

"Can't they heat the place?" asked Dr. Harlow sharply.

"O, yes," his wife assured him, "and they have all solemnly promised me to dry their skirts as soon as they get there! Hannah always contrives to get into puddles."

"She's not much changed," chuckled the little doctor. "Her language is as funny now and then as Frieda's. She told me they were going to relegate themselves on watermelon this evening!"

"It was a fortunate day for us when Catherine found her," and Dr. Helen's eyes smiled, as they always did when Hannah's image came before her mind. "And, do you know, I am very much pleased with Alice. She has the honestest eyes, and her manners are as unconscious and simple as can be. I should like to see her mother."

"Father's not so important, of course! But I agree with you, she's the true blue sort. It's Frieda for me, though. Of all inscrutable countenances, hers is the most. I believe she is, on the whole, the most unforeseen young person I have ever had dealings with, and in whatever direction she may choose to let herself out, in the future, she will do something interesting, or 'I shall astonish'!"

At which quotation from the young lady in question, they both laughed, and went out to their own supper, not at all sorry to have a quiet evening alone.

It was not a quiet evening in the little library. Behind the drawn shades, the boys and girls were busy spreading the long reading-table with a white cloth, setting out upon it the motley collection of plates, cups and silver ware which came out of the various picnic baskets, and an equally motley, but very appetizing, array of good things to eat. Winifred had laden Max with a chafing-dish, all legs and handles, he declared, and with this at one end, Bess' little copper teakettle at the other, Dorcas' asters for centerpiece and Polly's red-shaded candles at accurate intervals between, the whole effect was "very festival," as Frieda said admiringly.

As a finishing touch, Bertha and Algernon, official hosts, walked around the table laying typewritten catalog cards at each place.

The others swarmed around instantly, examining and commenting.

"Cunning!" "Real library place cards!" "What a pretty idea!" "But what do they mean?"

Algernon and Bertha only laughed.

"No one can sit down till he has found his proper place," said Algernon sternly. "This is a well-conducted library!"

"They all have the same number," cried Bert. "I'm on to that. See! It's the date, fixed up to look like the mystic symbols they mark the books with. 190.9 Se 16. September 16th, 1909. That's so much, gained. Now some of you others can figure out the rest. I've done my share."

The others wandered around the table, picking up the cards and laying them down again.

"Brightness, or Beauty," read Polly, disgustedly. "Imagine any one of us owning up to that! Of course, we all know we have them both, but who is going to claim them?"

"It's going to be a conflict between modesty and hunger soon, I can see that," said Archie.

"Peace and Purity are all well enough. If I could find a half-way sort like Perfect Honesty or Genius, I'd stop there! What's this? Bright Raven! I tell you, it's a game, made out of book titles. But I'll be jiggered if I ever heard of one of them."

"I never did, either," said Dorcas, shortly. "They must have hunted around in very queer places to find things that none of us know. Star of the Sea, though, does sound familiar. Isn't it one of Tennyson's?"

Bertha choked and turned away, avoiding Algernon's eye.

"Hurry up, and find yours, the rest of you," said Tom suddenly, "I'm fixed and I'm ready to eat."

Every one pounced upon him, to discover that he had chosen to install himself at a place marked The Whiskered One.

"I'm the only fellow here who ever wore a mustache," he said, "so it's plain, though rather far-fetched."

"It's not your place, though, Tom, truly," said Bertha. "I'm afraid we'll have to help. The librarian always does help stupid people."

"We won't ask him, though! If you two were bright enough to make these cards, we'll figure out the meanings or go without our supper," said Polly decisively, and the girls echoed her, though the boys groaned, and Max helped himself to a sandwich.

"Now, listen," said Polly. "I'm president of this club, and I call you all to order. I'll read the cards, one after another and you must all think, and perhaps we'll be able to get on to the system—I mean, to understand it."

Every one struck an attitude and waited while Polly walked up one side of the table and down the other, reading aloud in order:

"The Whiskered One. Chastity. Star of the Sea. A Twin. Consecrated to God. Extremely Bold; or Holy Prince. Peace. A Lover of Peace. Brightness, or Beauty. The Greatest One. Purity. The Woman Strong with the Spear. Bright Raven. Grace. A Gazelle. A Princess of Noble Birth."

When she had finished, there was a moment's silence and then everybody but Hannah burst out laughing.

With a little "O!" she flew across the room to the big dictionary, and opening it toward the back, dropped on her knees before it.

"I have it!" she cried joyfully. "I used to study and study the meanings of names when I was a youngster, and here they are. Mine means Grace and I know where I'm going to sit, and the rest of you can find out in a minute."

The long delayed supper was at last eaten, and sitting idly around the table, with watermelon rinds before them, the young people talked over the summer which seemed already closed.

"We've accomplished a lot, haven't we?" said Polly. "I'm really proud of the Boat Club this year. It never used to stand for anything but its own fun before, but from now on it will be a recognized factor in Winsted life."

"Bully for you, Polly!" said Bert. "I never heard any one say 'factor' offhand like that. It's one of the words I've always held sacred to special topics and theses and such."

"Like 'objective' and 'subjective'?" asked Polly. "I always feel about those as the old lady did about her pies, after she labelled them T. M."

"What did she label them like that for?" asked Frieda, leaning forward from her seat between Winifred and Archie.

"O, dear," sighed Bert in mock despair. "Frieda has made us explain all the old jokes we knew this summer, and I don't see how that one was overlooked. Did you ever hear the riddle about when a door is not a door, Frieda?"

"Yes," said Frieda good-naturedly. "It was in an English book I learned. There was a whole chapter on riddles, and the answers were printed upside down!"

"That dear Edith and Mary book!" cried Hannah. "Such a fine lot of riddles as there were! I think you and I ought to give a copy of that book to the library, Frieda!"

"That reminds me," exclaimed Algernon. "We have had gifts to-day. I saved them to tell you when you should all be listening, for they came to us through our honorary members, the Wide-Awakes."

"Hear!" "Hear!" shouted Max, but Polly rapped the meeting to order. Alice and Hannah and Catherine and Frieda looked puzzled, and the others interested, as Algernon went on.

"Mr. Kittredge told me to-day that they had voted to give the Sunday-school library books to us, as he thought the public library much more important than theirs, and they wanted to help all they could, following the good example of several of the Sunday-school teachers. That's a compliment to Dorcas and Catherine, both. So that's one of the four 'notorious Wide-Awakes,' as Mr. Graham calls them. And then a Mr. Tracy came in with his arms full of boxes, and said that his wife had been ill here at the hotel for some weeks, and she had amused herself during her convalescence with working on picture puzzles; now she was well and going away, she did not want to take them with her, and, as the Winsted Library had been a great help to her, she would like to give them these six or seven puzzles, to be loaned to people like books. She said she thought a small library like this where the librarian knew every one personally, could easily handle such a department, for convalescents and lonely old people. Pictures and games and all such things might be included, to be loaned at the librarian's discretion, only."

"What a good idea!" cried Polly, "but how do the Wide-Awakes come in on that?"

"Just this way. Mrs. Tracy said that if we would let her name the collection, she would be glad to add to it from time to time. And when we consented, as, of course, we did, she said she wanted it called The Hannah Eldred Department."

"Three cheers for Mrs. Tracy!" shouted Bert, and Max sprang to his feet and led off with a right good will. Then followed cheers for Hannah, for Catherine, for the Wide-Awakes and the Boat Club. When the noise subsided, Algernon took the floor again.

"That's not all, either! You know, most of you, that Frieda started the German part of the library, giving some books and an invaluable list; but none of you know what Miss Prescott told me a day or two ago. It is a secret, but I think she will let me tell it now, just for completeness, won't you, Miss Prescott?"

Alice blushed and smiled.

"If you really wish, but I don't like to be thanked for what is only a promise as yet."

"Never mind about that. It will be more than a promise soon. Miss Prescott does very clever designing, and she heard me lamenting the fact that we have no book-plate for the library, and most kindly offered to furnish one."

"I'll submit it to my teacher in designing," said Alice shyly, "and then Mr. Swinburne will present it to the Board to accept or reject as they see fit. You're not bound to take it, but I did want to help along somehow!"

"We ought to do that cheering all over again," said Archie, "but I move you, Madam President, that Miss Lange and Miss Prescott consider themselves specially included in the yells of a moment ago, and that the meeting proceed to sing the Boat Club song."

The passers-by, if there had been any, must have wondered at the joyous burst of song that followed this remark. As a matter of fact, however, there were no passers-by at all. The rain had washed the streets clear, and the corner lights, glimmering faintly through the wet, fell on one figure only.

Standing before the library window, holding a great cotton umbrella over his head, and peering patiently through a crack between the casing and the shade, was a small boy, in an overcoat several sizes too large for him.

Agnes' seat was near the window. Suddenly she saw a small nose and an inquiring eye pressed against the crack.

"Look!" she said, and all eyes followed her gesture.

Bert sprang to open the door and drag the dripping little figure in. Polly and Catherine quickly took off the great coat and shut the vast umbrella. Then they drew the little chap to the table, where Bertha had a plate of goodies ready for him.

"Attention, everybody!"

Max sprang to his feet.

"Sing to the air of the Boat Club Song:

"He is the Boat Club mascot, Give a cheer! give a cheer! For the Boat Club mascot, Elsmere! Elsmere!"

"Do it again!" cried Elsmere, brandishing a fork and making Bertha dodge, "Give a cheer, Elsmere! Boat Club stomach! Give a cheer!"



CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

AUF WIEDERSEHEN

Such a bustling place as Three Gables was on that Friday morning!

"It seems a pity that you can't stay till Monday, when college really opens," said Dr. Helen, pressing out a filmy waist in the dining-room, where the four girls were gathered, setting last stitches.

"But the new girls who have come on early and those who have had to take 'exams' are just the ones who need cheering up, and we are the official Comfort Committee, aren't we, Alice?"

Alice, fastening the thread after sewing in a fresh ruche, nodded. "Got to keep the blues away, or perish trying to," she said. "And Hannah has to be home before Monday. And Frieda needs a day or two to get settled. Hilda said she'd come back to-day, and they could get their room in order before Sunday. I'm so glad you're going to room with Hilda, Frieda dear. She's such a darling child."

"Is she still given to crushes?" asked Hannah. "She fairly worshiped Lilian Burton's door-sill when I was there."

"Crushes are going out of fashion at Dexter," said Catherine emphatically. "And one of the reasons I thought it would be good for Hilda to room with Frieda was that Frieda has too much sense to indulge in them, and she will keep Hilda suppressed."

"Catherine, you have such a positive manner when you talk about Dexter," said Hannah thoughtfully. "You'll be House President senior year. O, dear!" for Frieda, in getting up to help Dr. Helen fold up the ironing-board, had brushed by Hannah's chair, and a fat little button bag rolling to the floor had emptied its contents all over the room.

"Such a lot of buttons, Hannah!" exclaimed Dr. Helen, stooping to help gather them up.

Hannah laughed. "Mamma was so surprised when I came back from Dexter because there were as many in it as when I went, and I told her there were more because I had put in all the buttons that had come off while I was there! And then she was shocked!"

The doorbell rang and Inga came in with a big parcel for Catherine with Grandma Hopkins' compliments. Catherine opened it, wondering, and the others dropped their work.

"A cake! Did you ever in your life? And I already have Mrs. Graham's jelly, and Mr. Graham's bag of nuts, and old Mrs. Hitchcock's jar of preserves! Mother, how can I ever thank them all?"

"How can you ever get them all transported to Dexter, is what I'm wondering! Do they always send girls off to school with food for the term, Catherine?" asked Hannah.

"Well, I had cookies and mince pie to take last year, after my trunk was packed. Mother persuaded me to leave the pie, but I was sorry afterward. And one of Polly's mother's friends baked a chicken for her to carry all the way to Wellesley! People are so kind! How do you suppose I can carry this cake, though, Mother? It's such an awkward shape, and I couldn't pack it with my clothes!"

"Do you remember how Inez brought a pail of honey in her trunk," put in Alice, "and how it leaked out all over everything she had?"

"I'll put the cake into a stout hat-box, and fasten a heavy cord and a handle on it, and you can get it there safely, I think. You won't have to carry it, except just getting on and off the train." Dr. Helen hurried off to see to that bit of packing, herself.

Bertha, Agnes and Dot, and even Dorcas, found excuses to drop in at the house that morning. Win and Bess promised to be at the train. On the way home from school three or four of Catherine's Sunday-school children ran in to say good-by. Polly was in and out a dozen times, and Peter and Perdita came together to present a beautiful photograph of themselves in their newest garments and shiniest shoes. Dinner was interrupted by the trunkman's arrival, and Dr. Harlow had to keep a watchful eye upon each girl to see that she did not forget to eat.

Algernon and Bert came to escort the party to the station, and they started out merrily enough. When they reached the sidewalk, Catherine turned and ran back to the house for a private farewell to her mother, who preferred saying good-by there instead of going to the station. College seemed suddenly robbed of its pleasure, and the length of days between September and Thanksgiving intolerable, but they were used to helping each other be brave, and they blinked away the tears and parted smiling, Catherine turning frequently to wave good-bys till the house was lost in the trees.

It was quite like a reception at the station. While Dr. Harlow attended to ticket-buying, the young people clustered together, talking at random and laughing easily.

"It will be so lonely without you all," sighed Bess. "All the other college folk will be off by Tuesday at the latest, and here we shall languish!"

"You'll not have much time to languish if you assist in the kindergarten, Winifred," said Catherine affectionately. "I'm so glad you are going to do it! You'll make them sing like little nightingales. O, Bess, you go right by Grandma Hopkins' on the way home, don't you? Would you mind running in and telling her that the cake got off all right? I'll write her, of course, but I know she will want to know. Algernon! You don't mean it? Miss Ainsworth drawing her own novels! How perfectly delicious! O Max, there you are! What did Mr. Morse say? Was he pleased with the way we handled the paper?"

"Seemed to be. How I wish I were still on, to be able to write up your departure fittingly! I say, who's that odd little pair over there? They seem to be looking this way as if they wanted something."

The others turned and Frieda, who had been standing in a dreary silence, listening to the chatter of all these dear boys and girls whom she was leaving perhaps forever, suddenly ran across the platform to where a little old lady in black with a knitted shawl over her head, and a little old man in ill-fitting clothes were standing.

"We came to tell our little friend good-by," "And to wish her Gute Reise!" They spoke in a kind of duet.

"Here are a few poor blossoms from our garden—"

"That you forget not the old people—"

"And a trifle of Kuchen that I made myself—"

"And this I have carved for you, to put your pens on—"

Frieda, beaming and exclaiming her gratitude, made a pretty picture and the young people, observing her and hearing the rapid German, felt that they were seeing her in a better light than they had before, much as they had already learned to like and enjoy her.

Dot clung to Hannah, and the gentle Agnes, who had found Alice incredibly congenial, walked arm in arm with her a little apart from the others, while Catherine in the center of the group held her father's arm fast.

They were off at last.

"I thought that child in the back seat was Elsmere," sighed Catherine, starting up and dropping back again, relieved. "That child actually gets on my mind so that I expect to see him everywhere."

"Algernon tied him up, or he would have been there. He is a little rascal. It was a relief to me to have Perdita live up to her name and reputation, though," said Hannah. "I heard about her all summer as a little mischief, and I never saw her do an indecorous thing. I didn't see her do that."

"Well, you may mark my words," said Catherine, "before you have grown many years older you will hear astonishing tales of Perdita Osgood. Peter's influence will not always keep her in check. Polly told me that yesterday she tried to vaccinate the cat, with a mixture of ground chalk and vinegar! Peter came for help to prevent her!"

"American children are pretty bad, aren't they, Frieda?" said Alice mischievously, for Frieda's lips were set sternly.

"Don't make her say so," pleaded Hannah teasingly. "She has made such a beautiful record."

Frieda flushed a little, but slipped her hand into her pocket and felt there the shape of the little carved frame of Karl's picture and held her tongue once more. She would not quarrel with Hannah in this last hour for anything!

"Next year," Hannah said thoughtfully, "I am surely coming to Dexter, and you three are to get the fire-wall room for us, and we'll live in glory and rapture."

"If it were only this year!" Alice moaned out the words, and the others sighed with her. The excitement of getting off had died, and they were becoming painfully aware of the separation that was approaching with every revolution of the wheels.

There were other passengers in the car, but they felt peculiarly alone, none the less. It was a curious tie that bound them. They felt that their friendship, so oddly started, had something more vital in it than most school-girl relations. They had all been sorry to leave bright, lovable Polly, but still, so long as they four stayed together, nothing could matter very much.

"O, dear," sighed Hannah aloud. "I do think I spend all my time getting along without somebody or other!"

"'We meet so seldom, yet we surely part so often,'" quoted Catherine musingly.

"O, Catherine, my darling, if you dare begin on that sad Rossetti woman!" cried Alice. "You don't know how dreadful she is about it, Hannah! She goes about for days with a distant sad look in her eyes and, if she is spoken to suddenly, she says, 'When I was dead my spirit turned,' or 'Does the road wind uphill all the way? Yes, to the very end!' or something equally doleful. I feel as though some one were dying in the next room, and I do believe I'll hide the book."

"It won't do you any good," remarked Catherine serenely. "I know almost all of her by heart. But you must admit, Allie, that I do say cheerful things at times. You got sick of the Jumblies last year."

"They were as idiotic as the Rossetti lady, in another way. We'll never agree on such subjects, Catherine!"

"Well, anyhow, Catherine isn't going to read so much poetry this year," said Hannah.

"And Hannah is going to read more," rejoined Catherine, at which Hannah made a wry face and set them all laughing.

"Dexter!"

"Already? O, Hannah darling, how can we ever let you go on without us?"

All three were kissing her, but Hannah laughed at their sorrowful faces.

"I'll go out on the platform with you. And I'll carry the hat-box, Catrina. Shall you have a spread to-night? Oh! it's the same dear little, queer little station! And there's Miss Eliot, and Dy-the Allen! Glory! Glory! Glory! Dy-the, going on this train? Joy and rapture! I should have died of loneliness!"

And Hannah plunged down the steps and threw out her arms to embrace Dy-the, when thud! out fell the bottom of the hat-box, and with it Grandma Hopkins' lovely cake!

Miss Eliot looked into the distressed blue eyes and laughed.

"Just the same Hannah!" she said. "Dy-the, take good care of her and don't let her get lost in Chicago. Now, child, introduce me to your Frieda and get back on the train at once."

"Here she is," said Hannah, casting one more sad look at the shattered cake, over which a baggage-man had rolled a heavy truck. "And, Frieda, Miss Eliot is the one to go to, always, when you need anything, from shoe-strings to a scolding. O, Catherine, I'm so sorry. I just wanted to help!"

Catherine caught her in a mighty hug.

"Never you mind one minute. It would have given us indigestion, and it was so funny to see it go smash! Give your father my love, won't you, darling? And Aunt Clara, when you see her."

"And write from the very first station," said Alice. "I'm so glad Dy-the is going to be with you."

"Give Karl my greetings," said Frieda, holding on to Hannah's hand tightly. "And O, ever my love to Tante Edith and Uncle Edward!"

"Come, Babe, not another minute," and Dy-the, little but determined, plucked Hannah from detaining arms, and set her firmly on the platform of the rear car. There, as the train glided out, she stood, her eyes fixed upon the little group of three with arms around each other.

"Good-by! Good-by!" she called and they answered. Then Frieda ran a little nearer, holding out her arms in a pleading gesture, and over the noise of the retreating train their voices rang out together:

"Auf Wiedersehen!"

"Auf glueckliches Wiedersehen!"

THE END