ivy on it. It
shows you're forgiving."

"We're not," says Bonnie Bell. "We're far from it--at least my dad. He's
awful when you cross him. He won't quit--he'll never quit!"

"We all know that," says Katherine. "Everybody in the Row does."

"I don't know how much you know," says Bonnie Bell. "I don't know how
much people have talked about us."

"Well, I can tell you one thing," says Katherine. "We heard some of the
talk; and I want to say that it isn't favorable to the Wisners. There
are others in town besides them. Tell me, Honey, aren't you all the way
American?"

"Yes," says Bonnie Bell. "I can be a Daughter of the Revolution and a
Colonial Dame, and a Patriot Son, and all the rest, so far as having
ancestors is concerned."

"Could you?" says Katherine. "Then I rather guess you will!"

"We go back to the Carrolls a good deal, in Maryland," says Bonnie Bell.
"You see, my mother married my father and went West, and out there we
didn't pay much attention to such things. I didn't know they cared so
much here. But my people were first settlers and builders, and always
in the army and navy."

"How perfectly dear!" says Katherine. "We'll start you in as a Daughter;
that'll make Old Lady Wisner mad, but she can't help it--mommah will
take care of that. Then we'll make you a Dame next--that'll help things
along. And when you're in two or three more of these Colonial
businesses, where the Wisners can't get--well, then I'll be more
comfortable, for one.

"I don't blame your poppah for feeling savage towards the Wisners," says
she after a while. "Who're the Wisners anyways? Carrolls--huh! I guess
that's about as good as coming from Iowa and carrying your dinner in a
pail while you're getting your start selling sausage casings in a
basket. I don't think a packer's much nohow. We're in leather.

"But, good-by," says she now. "I've got to go home. I've got to tell
mommah to get those papers started. Pretty soon I'll bring Tom over."

Nothing much happened around our place for a little while. I didn't see
nobody from the Wisners' and I didn't care to. Kind of from force of
habit I used to walk up and down the line fence once in a while, just to
have a eye on it. I done that one evening and walked back towards our
garridge, for it seemed to me I heard some sort of noise down that way.
It wasn't far from the end of the wall that was close to the lake. I
set down and waited. It seemed to me like someone was trying to break