be kind--one could see that, thought Rosemary,
mechanically holding on to Shirley as Solomon speeded up in his haste
to reach the home barn.

She was very silent during the return drive and busied with her own
thoughts. Richard's quizzical announcement, "This car doesn't go any
further--end of the line, lady," woke her from her dreaming to find
that they were home.

As she lightly jumped to the ground, she put the gist of her
meditations into words:

"No," said Rosemary with conviction. "No, I wouldn't want to live at
the poor farm!"

Sarah remained untroubled by any idea of living at the poor farm, but
at the supper table that night she had an individual announcement to
make.

"All those people weren't deaf," she said placidly.

"How do you know?" Rosemary asked in astonishment.

"I found out," Sarah answered, buttering her mashed potato lavishly.

"But how?" insisted Rosemary, not without anxiety. One never knew what
Sarah would do next.

That small girl grinned impishly.

"I asked one old lady," she replied. "She said she wasn't. And that's
how I know."

CHAPTER XVI

SARAH'S SURPRISE

Winnie folded up a pair of stockings and dropped them into the
capacious bag which hung on the arm of her chair.

"It beats me," she said conversationally, "where Sarah runs to every
afternoon. It's been going on now for three weeks and she shuts up
like a clam when I ask her any questions."

Winnie and Mrs. Willis were seated in the cool, shaded living-room with
their mending. It was an intensely warm afternoon and several degrees
cooler inside the house than on the porch. Winnie insisted on helping
with the darning--she would have felt hurt had she been denied the task
of mating and sorting and mending the stockings and socks for the
family each week--and she took pride in assisting Mrs. Willis to keep
Doctor Hugh's belongings in perfect order.

"Mother!" Rosemary hurried in, her hair a tangle of waves and ringlets
dampened from heat and perspiration, her cheeks like scarlet poppies
and her eyes glowing with enthusiasm. "Mother, I've thought of
something!"

"Rosemary leads an exciting life," Jack Welles had once declared in
Mrs. Willis' hearing. "She can get all worked up about anything she
happens to be thinking about."

Rosemary's mother remembered this speech now, smiling a little at the
recollection.

"Richard and Warren are down in the tomato field, working their heads
off in this broi