itions, merry-go-rounds, peanut and lemonade stands, motor races,
a horse show--something to please the taste of every variety of
person. It was Cousin Jasper's custom to give the whole staff of
servants a holiday for the festival, although the cook usually waited
to serve an early lunch and Mrs. Brown came home before the others, to
set out a late supper. No influence on earth could ever persuade
Cousin Jasper to attend one of these merrymakings, but every other
person under his roof was absorbed in looking forward to the great
day of the summer. Elaborate preparations had been made and all that
was now in question was the weather, for to make such an event a
success it seemed absolutely necessary to have one of those clear,
blazing-hot days that seem specially to belong to circuses, fairs, and
midsummer festivals.

Janet was to go under the safe, but excited, wing of Mrs. Brown, and
Oliver, also, was looking forward to the day with some anticipation.

"I wonder if the Beeman and Polly will be there," he thought, and went
off into further speculation as to what the Beeman would look like in
the more civilized clothes that such an occasion would demand. "I
might not even know him," he reflected.

When the day came, however, cloudless, hot, just what such a day
should be, Oliver suddenly announced that he was not going.

"I don't like to leave Cousin Jasper all alone when he is so worried,"
he said to Janet, but could not explain why there should be any cause
for misgiving. "I didn't care a great deal about going anyway." He
refused to listen to her suggestion that she should stay also.

Lines of motors were rolling down the road from early morning onward,
filled with flannel-coated or befrilled holiday makers or laden with
farmers and farmers' wives and farmers' children. Janet and Mrs.
Brown, the one an excited flutter of white organdie skirts, the other
a ponderous rustle of tight brown taffeta, departed at ten o'clock
and by one the great house was empty of all save Oliver and Cousin
Jasper.

The afternoon seemed very still and very long, as one hour followed
another. Oliver strolled out to the gate and stood looking down the
road, but the procession of motors had long since come to an end, so
that the highway stretched, white and empty, to the far end of the
valley. Yet as he stood, idly staring out in the hot quiet, he thought
that he saw a small, dilapidated vehicle come round a distant turn and
advance slo