tories like that about people who are dead,"
said Felicity.

"Sometimes it's safer than when they're alive though, sweetheart,"
commented Dan.

We had our expected good dinner at Cousin Mattie's--may it be counted
unto her for righteousness. She and her sisters-in-law, Miss Louisa
Jane and Miss Caroline, were very kind to us. We had quite a nice time,
although I understood why Dan objected to them when they patted us
all on the head and told us whom we resembled and gave us peppermint
lozenges.

CHAPTER VIII. WE VISIT PEG BOWEN

We left Cousin Mattie's early, for it still looked like a storm, though
no more so than it had in the morning. We intended to go home by a
different path--one leading through cleared land overgrown with scrub
maple, which had the advantage of being farther away from Peg Bowen's
house. We hoped to be home before it began to storm, but we had hardly
reached the hill above the village when a fine, driving snow began to
fall. It would have been wiser to have turned back even then; but we
had already come a mile and we thought we would have ample time to reach
home before it became really bad. We were sadly mistaken; by the time
we had gone another half-mile we were in the thick of a bewildering,
blinding snowstorm. But it was by now just as far back to Cousin
Mattie's as it was to Uncle Alec's, so we struggled on, growing more
frightened at every step. We could hardly face the stinging snow, and we
could not see ten feet ahead of us. It had turned bitterly cold and
the tempest howled all around us in white desolation under the
fast-darkening night. The narrow path we were trying to follow soon
became entirely obliterated and we stumbled blindly on, holding to each
other, and trying to peer through the furious whirl that filled the air.
Our plight had come upon us so suddenly that we could not realize it.
Presently Peter, who was leading the van because he was supposed to know
the path best, stopped.

"I can't see the road any longer," he shouted. "I don't know where we
are."

We all stopped and huddled together in a miserable group. Fear filled
our hearts. It seemed ages ago that we had been snug and safe and warm
at Cousin Mattie's. Cecily began to cry with cold. Dan, in spite of her
protests, dragged off his overcoat and made her put it on.

"We can't stay here," he said. "We'll all freeze to death if we do. Come
on--we've got to keep moving. The snow ain't so deep yet. Take hold