and oppressive afternoon that they would never be able to move again.
Mr. Bob, Hinpoha's black cocker, shared in the prevailing laziness; he
lay sprawled on his back with all four feet up in the air, breathing in
panting gasps that shook his whole body. A bumble bee, blundering up on
the porch, broke the spell. It lit on Mr. Bob's face, whereupon Mr. Bob
sprang into the air, quivering with excitement, and knocked Hinpoha's
glass out of her hand. Hinpoha picked up the pieces with one hand and
patted Mr. Bob with the other.

"Poor old Bobbles," she said soothingly, "what a shame to make him move
so fast! Lucky I had finished the lemonade; there isn't any more in the
pitcher and we used the last lemons in the house."

Sahwah, roused from her reverie, sat up and began fanning herself with
greater energy. "Of all summers to have to stay in town!" she said
disconsolately. "I don't remember having such hot weather, ever."

"Neither does anyone else," said Migwan with a yawn. "So what's the use
wasting energy trying to remember anything worse? Didn't the paper say
'the present hot spell has broken all known records for June?'"

"It broke our thermometer, too," said Hinpoha, joining in the
conversation. "It went to a hundred and six and then it blew up and fell
off the hook."

"And to think that we might all have been out camping now, if Nyoda
hadn't gone away," continued Sahwah with a heavy sigh. "This is the
first summer for three years we won't be together. I can't get used to
the idea at all. Gladys is going to the seashore and Katherine is going
home to Arkansas in three weeks, and Nyoda is gone forever! I just
haven't any appetite for this vacation at all." And she sighed a still
heavier sigh.

The three lapsed into silence once more. Vacation had as little savor
for the other two as it did for Sahwah. Now that the summer's outing
with Nyoda had to be given up the next three months yawned before them
like an empty gulf.

"I'm never going to love anybody again the way I did Nyoda," remarked
Hinpoha cynically, after a long silence. "It hurts too much to lose
them."

"Neither am I," said Migwan and Sahwah together, and then there was
silence again.

"I'd like to see something wet once," said Sahwah fretfully, after
another long pause. "Everything is so dry it seems to be choking. The
grass is all burned up; the paint is all blistered; the shingles are all
curling up backwards. It makes my eyes hurt to look at thing