orrow just the same. Try to lay aside this trouble
at least for tonight and get a little sleep. In the morning I will speak
to Mr. Strong about it--"

"And remember to speak to God about it, too," murmured drowsy Peace,
stumbling upstairs in front of the weary mother-sister.

CHAPTER XX

AT THE BROKER'S OFFICE

"This is Saturday morning, Gail, and Mrs. Grinnell says I can go to
Martindale with her if you will let me," said Peace, a few days after
their midnight conference. She might have added that she herself had
asked for the invitation, but for reasons of her own she made no mention
of this fact.

Gail looked up from the pan of yeast she was "setting," and hesitatingly
began, "Well--"

"I've wiped the dishes and fed the hens and dusted the parlor--"

"But I haven't swept the parlor yet," Gail protested.

"I can't help that. I have dusted," Peace answered, firmly. "If I had
waited until you got ready to sweep, Mrs. Grinnell would have been
gone."

Gail giggled in spite of her efforts to check the smile on her lips, and
then soberly said, "But what about the eggs?"

"I have delivered my bunch already."

"Why, Peace, those baskets weren't full! What will Mrs. Abbott think?"

"Oh, I fixed that all right. There wasn't time to do much hunting for
our own eggs, so I borrowed the rest of Mrs. Hartman."

"Peace Greenfield! What shall I do with you?" cried the older sister in
utter discouragement, dropping her hands from her pan of mixing in a
gesture of despair which scattered a cloud of flour over herself and the
impatient pleader.

"Let me go with Mrs. Grinnell," was the prompt reply. "I won't be in
your way all day, then; and while I am gone, the hens will have laid
enough eggs to pay back Mrs. Hartman. I borrowed only five. Twenty-eight
hens ought to be able to lay that many before I get back. The eight
biddies I bought with the rest of my melon money could do better than
that, Gail. Please say I can go!"

Perhaps it was the sight of the wistful little face, perhaps it was
visions of a quiet day in which to attend to housework that won the
desired permission; but at any rate Gail consented reluctantly, and
Peace danced away to find the kind neighbor and report the sister's
decision.

"My, but I'm glad," she hummed to herself as she scrambled into her best
dress and flew out of the door into the warm autumn sunshine. "I thought
she wouldn't let me go, and then I couldn't get the money. Oh, I am