mer
in the air to-night."

Aunt Agatha merely stared. The Westfalls were congenital enigmas.

"A gypsy cart!" she gurgled presently, rising phoenix-like at last from
a dumb-struck supineness. "A gypsy cart! Well! A wheelbarrow
wouldn't have surprised me more, Diane, a wheelbarrow with a motor!"

"Don't you remember Mrs. Jarley's wagon?" reminded Diane. "It had
windows and curtains--"

"Surely," broke in Aunt Agatha with strained dignity, "you're not going
in for waxworks like Mrs. Jarley!"

"Dear, no!" laughed Diane, with a sparkle of amusement in her eyes.
"There are so many wild flowers and birds and legends to study I
shouldn't have time!"

"Great heavens," murmured Aunt Agatha faintly, "my ears have gone queer
like mother's."

"And maybe I'll not be back for a year," offered Diane calmly. "I can
work south through the winter--"

Aunt Agatha fell tragically back in her chair and gasped.

"Didn't we take a whole year to motor over Europe?" demanded Diane
impetuously. "And that was nothing like so fascinating as my gypsy
house on wheels."

"If I could only have looked ahead!" breathed Aunt Agatha, shuddering.
"If only I could have foreseen what notions you and Carl were fated to
take in your heads, I'd have refused your grandfather's legacy. I
would indeed. Here I no more than get Carl safely home from hunting
Esquimaux or whatever it was up there by the North Pole--walravens,
wasn't it, Diane?--well, walrus then!--than you decide to become a
gypsy and sleep by a lake in springtime under a planting moon and stay
outdoors all winter, collecting birds, when I fancied you were safely
launched in society until you were married."

"But Aunt Agatha," flashed the girl, "I'm not at all anxious to marry."

Aunt Agatha burst into a calamitous shower of tears.

"Aunt Agatha," said Diane kindly, "why not remember that you're no
longer burdened with the terrible responsibility of bringing Carl and
me up? We're both mature, responsible beings."

Aunt Agatha dabbed defiantly at her eyes.

"Well," she said flatly, "I shan't worry, I just shan't. I'm past
that. There was a time, but at my time of life I just can't afford it.
You can do as you please. You can go shoot alligators if you want to,
Diane, I shan't interpose another objection. But the trials that I've
endured in my life through the Westfalls, nobody knows. I was a
cheerful, happy person until I knew the Westfalls. And your father was
notio