a
diamond ring into a big davenport.... Are we going to be dreadfully
poor?"

"Oh, not pawn-shop poor. I made VanZile boost my salary, last week,
and with my Touricar stock I'm getting a little over four thousand
dollars a year."

"Is that lots or little?"

"Well, it 'll give us a decent apartment and a nearly decent maid, I
guess. And if the Touricar keeps going, we can beat it off for a year,
wandering, after maybe three four years."

"I hope so. Here we are! That's Mrs. Pat waiting for us."

The Patton Kerr house, set near the top of the highest hill in that
range of the Berkshires, stood out white against a slope of crisp
green; an old manor house of long lines and solid beams, with striped
awnings of red and white, and in front a brick terrace, with
basket-chairs, a swinging couch, and a wicker tea-table already
welcomingly spread with a service of Royal Doulton. From the terrace
one saw miles of valley and hills, and villages strung on a rambling
river. The valley was a golden bowl filled with the peace of
afternoon; a world of sun and listening woods.

On the terrace waited a woman of thirty-five, of clever face a bit
worn at the edges, carefully coiffed hair, and careless white blouse
with a tweed walking-skirt. She was gracefully holding out her hand,
greeting Carl, "It's terribly good of you to come clear out into our
wilderness." She was interrupted by the bouncing appearance of a
stocky, handsome, red-faced, full-chinned, curly-black-haired man of
forty, in riding-breeches and boots and a silk shirt; with him an
excited small boy in rompers--Patton Kerr, Sr. and Jr.

"Here you are!" Senior observantly remarked. "Glad to see you,
Ericson. You and Ruthie been a deuce of a time coming up from town.
Holding hands along the road, eh? Lord! these aviators!"

"Pat!"

"Animal!"

----protested Mrs. Kerr and Ruth, simultaneously.

"All right. I'll be good. Saw you fly at Nassau Boulevard, Ericson.
Turned my horn loose and hooted till they thought I was a militant,
like Ruthie here. Lord! what flying, what flying! I'd like to see you
race Weymann and Vedrines.... Ruthie, will you show Mr. Ericson where
his room is, or has poor old Pat got to go and drag a servant away
from reading _Town Topics_, heh?"

"I will, Pat," said Ruth.

"I will, daddy," cried Pat, Jr.

"No, my son, I guess maybe Ruthie had better do it. There's a certain
look in her eyes----"

"Basilisk!"

"Salamander!"

Ruth and Carl