own Hall and listened to the speeches--it was terrific! I
guess the Streets and their crowd felt pretty small, because they
got--what was it, Len?"

"Seventeen votes out of one hundred and eleven!" Len said, not moving
his eyes from the road before him.

"My house is right down there, next door to Uncle Ben's," said Sally,
craning her neck suddenly. "You can't see it, but no matter; there's
lots of time! Here's the Hawkes's place; remember that?"

"I remember everything," Martie said, smiling. "We're nearly home!"

The old Monroe house looked shabby, even in the spring green. Martie
had seen the deeper, fresher green of the East for six successive
springs. The eucalyptus trees wore their tassels, the willows' fresh
foliage had sprung over the old rusty leaves. A raw gateway had been
cut, out by the old barn, into Clipper Lane, and a driveway filled in.
Tired, confused, train-sick, Martie got down into the old yard, and the
old atmosphere enveloped her like a garment. The fuchsia bushes, the
marguerites so green on top, so brown and dry under their crown of
fresh life, the heliotrope sprawling against the peeling boards under
the dining-room windows, and tacked in place with strips of kid
glove--how well she knew them!

They went in the side door, and through the dark dining room, odorous
of vegetable soup and bread and butter. An unearthly quiet held the
house. Pa's door was closed; Martie imagined the room darker and more
grim than ever.

Lydia had given her her old room; the room in which she and Sally had
grown to womanhood. It was as clean and bare as a hotel room. Lydia and
Sally had discussed the advisability of a bowl of flowers, but had
decided flowers might remind poor Mart of funerals. Martie remembered
the counterpane on the bed and the limp madras curtains at the windows.
She put her gloves in a bureau drawer lined with folded newspaper, and
hung her wraps in the square closet that was, for some unimaginable
reason, a step higher than the room.

Lydia sat on the bed, and Sally on a chair, while Martie slowly moved
about her new domain. The children had gone into the yard, 'Lizabeth
and Billy charged not to let their little cousin get his clothes dirty;
when the trunks came, with his overalls, he could get as dirty as he
pleased.

The soiled, tumbled contents of the hand bag, after the five days'
trip, filled Martie with a sort of weary concern. She stood, puzzling
vaguely over the damp washcloth th