ll to sequester him as far off
as possible. "It is right on the edge of the pines, and faces the west.
The sunsets are beautiful from there."

"No, no," he repeated. "I like the sound of the water. I hear falls below
here. I will take that tent I see over there."

So came the first tent dweller to Greenacres. Kit had still been in doubt,
and taking no chances on strangers within the gates, she had guided Mr.
Ormond up to her father to make the closing arrangements on renting the
waterfall tent, as the girls called it, for the entire summer. The most
amazing part was that he left a check that first day for $75.00, full
rental for ten weeks.

"I must not be interrupted or bothered by little things," he told Mr.
Robbins, earnestly. "I must have perfect isolation or I cannot do my
work."

"Now, what on earth do you suppose he meant by that?" Kit asked, after the
underslung gray roadster had passed out of sight. "My goodness, girls, he
may be a counterfeiter. You can bet a cookie Gilead would look upon him as
a suspicious character when he could pay seventy-five dollars right down
all at once."

"I rather liked his face," Mrs. Robbins remarked, "and he gave your father
excellent business references. I think you're very fortunate that he
happened to travel this way."

He arrived promptly the following day and arranged with Shad to put up the
automobile in the barn.

"Well, I've lugged down all his belongings to the tent," Shad said, rather
hopelessly, that night, "and I can't find out for the life of me what kind
of business he's in. He had a lot of heavy bundles, and I asked him a few
questions about them, but he didn't seem to take kindly to it, so I let
him alone. There's one thing though he's got, and that's a big photograph
in a silver frame of an all-fired handsome woman he says is his wife.
She's dressed just like a queen, crown and all."

Helen's eyes were bright with interest, as she listened, but Kit's
straight, dark brows were drawn together in a frown of perplexity.

"I suppose we'll just have to wait until we find out," she said, "but
we'll hope for the best. Piney says he's made arrangements to buy eggs and
chickens from them, so I see where our paying guests are going to scatter
prosperity around the neighborhood."

Ralph MacRae and Honey arrived the seventeenth of June and took the Turtle
Cove tent. The girls did not see very much of them until after Jean came
up from the city, but then Ralph becam