n three years before, when the other young Lanes had been
negligible factors in all matters of business, and he, by the divine
right of his twenty-one years, had, upon the death of his father, taken
the management of the family affairs into his own hands.

Sally drew a long breath of relief. Anyhow, she now had more than two
months' reprieve. By the end of that period something might happen to
make Max willing to extend it. The tent had been put up again, and all
but Max had returned to sleeping in it. He had announced that he cared to
take no more chances with thunderstorms and cyclones, so Sally had
arranged comfortable quarters for him in the house, in one of the smaller
downstairs rooms, looking out upon the grove. There was a fireplace in
this room, and Bob had placed a well-stocked wood-box beside it, so that
his brother might have no excuse for feeling himself neglected.

"Your compromise gives you so much the bigger half of the bargain," said
Josephine, her brilliant dark eyes fixed on Max, "that I think you ought
to give Sally something to boot. Isn't that the word?"

"What does she want? The house furnished for the two months?"

"Much simpler than that. Sally and I want to have our friends out for
a frolic."

"In an empty house?"

"Yes. What jollier place for a lot of fun? Only it wouldn't seem empty by
the time we had put up a lot of flags and bunting and goldenrod and
balsam branches. That long drawing-room of yours, with crash on the
floor--and a harp and violins behind a screen--and Chinese lanterns all
over the rooms and on the porch and down the driveway--"

Josephine's imagination worked fast. She had gone into a dozen
specifications before Max could get a chance to interpose.

"Very fine, very fine! And a supper-table, loaded with salads and
ices. Glorious idea! How much do you think all this would cost? Of
course that's of no consequence, but just out of curiosity I should
like to know."

"Goodness, we've boxes of lanterns, rolls of bunting and flags, and yards
of crash left from parties way back to my first birthday ones," Josephine
assured him. "As for the supper--" She paused to think it out, for party
suppers are unquestionably expensive details.

"Wait till October and make it a husking-bee," suggested Donald Ferry.
He had become in these few weeks as much a member of this circle of
friends as if he had always belonged to it. "Then you'll need only coffee
and doughnuts and apples and t