o
the cottage to play, we'd not care to get there when she's eating
breakfast."

"Well, I guess there's no chance of doing that, Leslie. Look at the
clock. It is after eight now, and we're still at table."

"I'll go over with you at nine," Leslie said, and when the clock
struck nine, she found him just outside the door, his shrill whistle
having told her where to find him.

"Come on!" he cried. "It's nine, and if you won't come with me now
I'll go over to see Rose without you."

"Well, I'll have to go back now," Leslie said, and turning, she ran
across the hall, and up the stairway, laughing as she went.

"Good-bye!" shouted Harry, and off he sped, thinking it a great joke
on Leslie that he should keep his word, and because she was causing
the delay, run off to the cottage instead of waiting for her.

Leslie, never dreaming but that he was waiting on the walk just
outside the door, wondered that he did not whistle or call to her to
hurry.

She had gone back for a book that she intended to give Rose, and in
her haste she could not at once find it.

At last she saw a bit of its cover beneath a mass of lace and ribbon,
in the corner of the drawer where she had placed it for safe keeping,
and catching it up, flew down the stairway and out upon the porch.

For a moment she paused, wondering where Harry might be, when a merry
shout made her look up.

Away up the avenue, just opening the cottage gate, was Harry, and even
as she looked, he disappeared behind the tall shrubbery in the garden.

"Well, isn't he great?" Leslie said, as she started to run.

Rose and Harry were just behind a tall shrub that overhung the
gateway, and as Leslie pushed the gate open they sprang forward in a
fine attempt to startle her, but she only laughed.

"You couldn't make me jump," she said, "because I saw a bit of Rose's
pink dress between the branches, and Harry moved his head so that I
saw his yellow hair."

"Why didn't you speak, and tell us you knew where we were hiding?"
Harry asked, a nice bit vexed that Leslie had not "jumped."

"I thought you ought to have the fun of springing out at me, after
you'd hidden so nicely," Leslie said.

"Better luck next time," said Rose, and together they ran around
behind the cottage to learn if the little brook was as clear, and as
rippling as when Rose, in the early Summer, had sailed her little boat
upon it.

"The brook is here!" cried Harry. "It hasn't run away yet."

A ragged litt