its two orchards. Asters, blue
and white, clustered thick to its threshold, honeysuckle swung buff
trumpets from the vine about the windows. The smoke from the white
chimney rose and drifted lazily away across the russet meadow, which
ended at the once mysterious hedge. The place was silent with the
silence of a happy dream, basking content in the hazy sunlight of the
late September afternoon.

Mrs. Sturgis, with a little sound of surprised delight, was about to
move forward again, when her son checked her once more. For as she
looked, Kirk came to the door. He was carrying a pan and a basket. He
felt for the sill with a sandaled toe, descended to the wide door-stone,
and sat down upon it with the pan on his knees. He then proceeded to
shell Lima beans, his face lifted to the sun, and the wind stirring the
folds of his faded green blouse. As he worked he sang a perfectly
original song about various things.

Mrs. Sturgis could be detained no longer. She ran across the brown
grass and caught Kirk into her arms--tin pan, bean-pods, and all. She
kissed his mouth, and his hair, and his eyes, and murmured ecstatically
to him.

"Mother! _Mother_!" Kirk cried, his hands everywhere at once; and then,
"Phil! _Quick_!"

But Phil was there. When the Sturgis family, breathless, at last sorted
themselves out, every one began talking at once.

"_Don't_ you really think it's a nice place?"

"You came sooner than we expected; we meant to be at the gate."

"Oh, my dear dears!"

"_Mother_, come in now and see everything!" (This from Kirk, anxious to
exhibit what he himself had never seen.)

"Come and take your things off--oh, you _do_ look so well, dear."

"Look at the nice view!"

"Don't you think it looks like a real house, even if we did get it?"

"Oh, children _dear_! let me gather my poor scattered wits."

So Mrs. Sturgis was lovingly pulled and pushed and steered into the
dusky little living-room, where a few pieces of Westover Street
furniture greeted her strangely, and where a most jolly fire burned on
the hearth. Felicia removed her mother's hat; Ken put her into the big
chair and spirited away her bag. Mrs. Sturgis sat gazing about her--at
the white cheese-cloth curtains, the festive bunches of flowers in every
available jug, the kitchen chairs painted a decorative blue, and at the
three radiant faces of her children.

Kirk, who was plainly bursting with some plan, pulled his sister's
sleeve.

"Phil," he whi