now you promised Keith you would do anything he
wanted, and that is what he was trying to ask for?"

Mr. Maclntyre put his arm around the earnest little fellow, and drew him
to his knee, smiling down into the upturned face that waited eagerly for
his answer.

"I only asked that to hear what you would say, my son," was the answer.
"You need have no worry about the money. I'll keep my promise to Keith,
and Jonesy shall have his home. I'm not a knight, but I'm proud to be
the father of two such valiant champions. Please God, you'll not be
alone in your battles after this, to right the world's wrongs. I'll be
your faithful squire, or, as we'd say in these days, a sort of silent
partner in the enterprise."

Several days after this a deed was recorded in the county court-house,
conveying a large piece of property from old Colonel Lloyd to Malcolm
and Keith Maclntyre. It was the place adjoining "The Locusts," on which
stood a fine old homestead that had been vacant for several years. The
day after its purchase a force of carpenters and painters were set to
work, and two coloured men began clearing out the tangle of bushes in
the long-neglected garden.

Jonesy know nothing of what was going on, and wondered at the long
conversations which took place between the old professor and Mr.
Maclntyre, always in German. It was the professor who found some one to
take care of the home, as Virginia had suggested. He recommended a
countryman of his, Carl Sudsberger, who had long been a teacher like
himself. He was a gentle old soul who loved children and understood
them, and a more motherly creature than his wife could not well be
imagined. Everything throve under her thrifty management, and she had no
patience with laziness or waste. Any boy in whose bringing up she had a
hand would be able to make his way in the world when the time came
for it.

Mrs. Dudley and Miss Allison helped choose the furnishings, but Virginia
felt that the pleasure of it was all hers, for she was taken to the city
every time they went, and allowed a voice in everything. Several trips
were necessary before the house was complete, but by the last week in
May it was ready from attic to cellar.

It was the "Fairchance" that the boys had planned so long, with its
rose-bordered paths, the orchard and garden and outlying fields. Nothing
had been forgotten, from the big Newfoundland dog on the doorstep, to
the ducks on the pond, and the little speckled pigs in the