Jones doesn't know anything about it. Don't fret, dearie! There may
be lots of ways out of our trouble without our having to separate. I
_hope_ so. We have a month to think and plan; but if we must scatter for
a time among our kind friends, I trust we will all go bravely and do our
best to please."

"But I _can't_ go to the Judge's, Gail! He's a perfect fury, gets mad at
nothing, and chaws his mustache and glares so ugly I always listen to
see whether he's going to growl like Towzer."

"He has the finest house in town," said Faith consolingly, "and a piano
and a horse and buggy. He is going to have an automobile next summer."

"I'd rather live with nice folks than with pianos and nautomobiles,"
Peace interrupted. "I don't know what he wants of another girl, unless
it is for Len and Hector to tease."

"I thought you liked Len?"

"He used to be nice, but since he's began going to scollege, he's
horrid. He saw me yesterday morning in Cherry's dress, 'cause I tore my
last clean one; and he bugged his two eyes out like he was awfully
s'prised, and said, 'Mah deah child, yoah dress is too long! I don't
like the looks of it.'" She mimicked the college dude's affected airs so
perfectly that the three sisters shouted with laughter, forgetting for
the moment their heavy burden of care.

"What did you say?" asked Faith curiously, although in her heart she
knew that Len must have met his match.

"I looped my fingers up in circles like make-b'lieve eye-glasses, and
said, 'Mah deah man, yoah hat is too tall and yoah pants ah too wide. I
don't like the looks of them, but I am too p'lite to say so.'"

Another shout of mirth made the rafters ring, and the trio laughed till
they cried, much to Peace's surprise, for the scene she had just
depicted had caused her much indignation, and she could see nothing
funny about it. "If you don't be stiller you'll wake the children," she
warned them in her most grandmotherly tones, and they sobered quickly,
remembering the ghost of trouble hovering over the little house.

For a long time they sat there in silence, each one busy with her own
disturbed thoughts, unaware that the fire in the stove had died out, or
that the chimes had long since struck midnight.

Suddenly Gail lifted her eyes from the hole in the carpet, at which she
had been staring unseeingly, glanced at the old clock on the wall, and
exclaimed, "Girls, it's a quarter to one! Fly into bed, every one of
you! School keeps tom