ng?"

William Hender had no answer ready, and sat trying in vain to find one.

"If she were to begin in a small way, such as I'm suggesting, who knows
but what, in time, she might work up a little business, and be able to
make quite a nice little living out of her flowers and things? She has a
wonderful gift for raising them and understanding them, and it does seem a
sin not to make use of it. Don't you think so?"

William Hender nodded thoughtfully; this new way of looking at things
impressed him. He was proud, too, of Bella's skill with her garden, and
his thoughts flew beyond the present to the future, where in his mind's
eye he saw a tidy little shop well stocked with fruit and flowers and
vegetables, and Bella the prosperous owner of it all, and his heart
swelled with pride.

"You are right, Maggie," he said, as he rose to go. "You always are, I
think. I'll talk to Emma about it, and I'll look about me the next time I
go to Norton, and see if there's any shop there that'll be likely to take
her flowers. It might be better for her to sell them that way.
Good-night."

Bella's heart beat fast and furious when she heard that her father
approved of the scheme, and when the children were told about it they all
flew into a state of wild excitement. Of course they all wanted to be
market-gardeners at once. "Why can't we all go shares in a stall in
Norton Market?" cried Tom. "Bella can sell flowers and herbs, and me
vegetables, and Charlie fruit, and Margery----"

"Fairy roses," said Margery eagerly. She always called her flowers that
had come so mysteriously 'fairy flowers.'

"I was in Norton Market-house once," went on Tom, "and oh, it's a fine
place!"

Norton, their nearest and largest market-town, was five miles off, and as
there was no railway to it, and they had no cart to take them, a visit to
the town was one of the rarest treats they knew.

When the first excitement had worn off, and Aunt Emma had been talked to
and won over, and all that remained to be done was for their father to go
to Norton and look out for a florist, matters seemed to go no further.
He was at work on every day of the week except Saturday afternoons, and
then there was always so much to be done at home he never seemed able to
spare the time. Five miles to Norton and five miles back was a long
distance to cover, with no other means of covering it than one's own two
feet, or a chance 'lift'; and he kept on putting the matter