, the _contrary_ little
bastes, that would nivir stay to home at all, at all, no matter if ye
give them the whole farm to ate up. Tom rode up and stood talking with
them, and Elizabeth, watching him through the raspberry bushes for
signs of a package of candy, saw him take a letter from his pocket.
Then he pointed to the straying turkeys going "peep, peep" over the
hillside, and, as Granny turned to look at them, he slipped the letter
into Annie's hand. Elizabeth remembered having seen Tom do this once
or twice before, when he came over of an evening. She wondered what
this could be about, and decided to ask Annie as soon as she came.
Suppose it should be a letter from Mrs. Jarvis, saying she had started!

Her sister was a long time in coming, and when she did appear at last,
walking along the path, she came very slowly. She was reading the
letter and smiling very tenderly and happily over it.

"Hello, Annie!" shouted Elizabeth, scrambling up on the fence top. The
letter disappeared like a flash into the folds of Annie's skirt; and at
once Elizabeth's older self told her she must not ask questions about
that letter, must not even allude to it. Some faint recollection of
that early dawn when she had seen the farewell in their orchard drifted
through her mind.

"Why, Lizzie," said her older sister, "how did you come here?" She
caught sight of the books. John carried the dinner-pail on condition
that Elizabeth bore the school-bag. "Haven't you got home yet?"

"No. The boys went 'way round, miles below the mill to hunt moles, and
I got into the creek. And just look at my stockings, Annie!"

"Oh, Lizzie!" cried her sister in distress, "what will aunt say?" then
added that which always attached itself to Elizabeth's misdemeanors,
"What would Mrs. Jarvis think if she were to come to-day?"

"Oh, bother! I don't believe she'll ever come for years and years,"
said Elizabeth recklessly. "Do you, Ann; now, really?"

"Ye-s, I think she might soon be here now." Something in her big
sister's voice made Elizabeth look up quickly. Dimples were showing in
Annie's cheeks. Her eyes were radiant.

"Oh, _do_ you think so? Well, Horace promised to come anyway, but what
makes you think she'll come soon?"

Annie shook her head, still smiling. "Aw, do tell me," coaxed
Elizabeth. "Did aunt get a letter?"

"No," the dimples were growing deeper, the eyes brighter, "but if she's
coming at all she's coming this week, bec