ell, Goodloe thinks that the ideal public school system is only to be
executed in a democratic--" father was saying, when Nickols interrupted
him.

"What does it matter where the two and a half kids from the decadent old
families that are dying out go to school? Their sterile parents can
motor 'em down to education!" he exclaimed. "Right here is the logical
place for the school with the meadow behind it to give a bit of
distance, the oak grove back of that, the Country Club beyond, with the
river beginning to curve it in. It solidifies and unifies the landscape
of the whole town and puts all the community centers where they belong.
The Town and Settlement straggled a bit before, but the chapel and the
school will unite them! Braid says the schoolhouse can be built of
weathered stone and concrete and finished by September fifth, in time to
start school. Wilkerson can begin immediately putting out his hedges and
the Reverend Gregory is down there now finishing laying out the
playground with his ball park."

"That's it--that's the baseball nine Dabney is washing Mikey for!"
exclaimed Charlotte, catching up with the conversation. "And when we all
go to school with the Settlements and they are clean some, and Mildred
Payne and Grace Sproul and some of the others get dirty a little, nobody
will know the difference and we can play ball and scouts and everything
Minister teaches us. That school makes enough children to do things. We
haven't got enough for anything, but the Settlements have, and it is
mighty good of them to come up and let us play with them."

"Keep up with the times, Charlotte; don't be a back number. Miss
Olymphia Lassiter's school may have held you and Nell, but it will never
hold young Charlotte," Nickols jeered, as father began to roll up the
map and speak to a young man that the great Wilkerson of White Plains
had sent down to juggle with the flora and fauna of the Harpeth Valley.

CHAPTER X

WATER AND OIL

I turned from Nickols' raillery and surveyed the great American garden.
The weeks had flown from May to late July and father's plans were
beginning to be materialized. Where the sunken garden had been filled in
a wide stone well house, the like of which can be found at many of the
farmhouses in the Harpeth Valley, had been built and a chain wheel and
bucket drew up the water from the deep cistern, which was supplied with
underground pipes from the south wing of the Poplars.

"There is no