inter apples, from skating against
the wind, and they were almost breathless after their long run up-hill
to the depot. Racing across the platform, they bumped against the door
at the same instant, burst it noisily open, and slammed it behind them
with a bang that shook the entire building.

"What kind of a cyclone has struck us now?" growled the ticket agent,
who was in the next room. Then he frowned, as the first noise was
followed by the rasping sound of a bench being dragged out of a corner,
to a place nearer the stove. It scraped the bare floor every inch of the
way, with a jarring motion that made the windows rattle.

Stretching himself half-way out of his chair, the ticket agent pushed up
the wooden slide of the little window far enough for him to peep into
the waiting-room. Then he hastily shoved it down again.

"It's the two little chaps who came out from the city last week," he
said to the station-master. "The Maclntyre boys. You'd think they own
the earth from the way they dash in and take possession of things."

The station-master liked boys. He stroked his gray beard and chuckled.
"Well, Meyers," he said, slowly, "when you come to think of it, their
family always has owned a pretty fair slice of the earth and its good
things, and those same little lads have travelled nearly all over it,
although the oldest can't be more than ten. It would be a wonder if they
didn't have that lordly way of making themselves at home wherever
they go."

"Will they be out here all winter?" asked Meyers, who was a newcomer in
Lloydsborough.

"Yes, their father and mother have gone to Florida, and left them here
with their grandmother Maclntyre."

"I imagine the old lady has her hands full," said Meyers, as a sound of
scuffling in the next room reached him.

"Oh, I don't know about that, now," said the station-master. "They're
noisy children, to be sure, and just boiling over with mischief, but if
you can find any better-mannered little gentlemen anywhere in the State
when there's ladies around, I'd like you to trot 'em out. They came down
to the train with their aunt this morning, Miss Allison Maclntyre, and
their politeness to her was something pretty to see, I can tell
you, sir."

There was a moment's pause, in which the boys could be heard laughing in
the next room.

"No," said the station-master again, "I'm thinking it's not the boys who
will be keeping Mrs. Maclntyre's hands full this winter, so much as
that li