erry,
sniffing at the discolored, unappetizing mess in the pan.

Peace examined it critically, tasted it, made a wry face, and finally
announced, "It's spoiled, I guess. Never mind, there is plenty of good
rice left--"

"Oh, Peace!" yelled Allee excitedly, dancing in the chair, where she
stood trying to stir the heavy contents of another pan. "Something else
is burning, sure! See the black smoke!"

There was a knock at the door, but Peace was frantically tugging at the
big kettle stuck fast to the stove cover, and without pausing in her
task, she called crossly, "You will have to wait till we can get this
rice 'tended to before we can see what you want, whoever you are. We are
all busy in here."

There was an audible chuckle from without, the knob turned, Cherry
screamed, and a gray-haired, shabby, old man stood smiling at them from
the steps. Peace scarcely looked at him as she succeeded in freeing the
panful of smoking, blackened rice from the cover, but that quick glance
had told her the visitor was a tramp, and she snapped sharply, "I s'pose
you want a bite to eat. Well, I don't see how you are going to get it
here! I've just killed the cow, and the rice has burned up. Cherry, stop
stirring that mess and take it off! Can't you see it's smoking like a
_chimbly_?"

The tramp strode across the room, grabbed the teakettle and poured the
boiling water into the pan, over which Allee had mounted guard, and
which fortunately was on the back of the stove so it had not yet arrived
at the burning point. He caught up one other, dumped about half its
contents into a clean saucepan on the hearth, saturated it with water,
threw in some salt, and set it back on the stove, at the same time
removing a third kettle of burning rice and carrying it out of doors.

"There!" he said, entering the kitchen again. "All the rice isn't
spoiled. Now we will open the windows and let out this smoke, and we are
all right. How did you come to cook so much?"

"We were hungry, and thought we could eat a lot--"

"But rice swells--"

"We have found that out for ourselves," said Peace, blushing furiously
at his quizzical grin. "It's the first time we ever cooked it alone."

"Where are the sisters?"

"Gail and Faith are in the city, and Hope hasn't come home from Edwards'
house yet."

"And you are hungry? Well, now, that is too bad. I'll tell you what I
will do. You show me where you keep things and I will get supper, if you
will permit me