audience.

"He's got the jury," said Wilbur Smythe to Colonel Woodruff.

"Yes," said the colonel, "and right here is where he runs into danger. Can
he handle the crowd when it's with him?"

"Well," said Jim, "I think we ought to organize one, but I've another
proposition first. Let's get together and pool our cream. By that, I mean
that we'll all sell to the same creamery, and get the best we can out of
the centralizers by the cooperative method. We can save two cents a pound
in that way, and we'll learn to cooperate. When we have found just how
well we can hang together, we'll be able to take up the cooperative
creamery, with less danger of falling apart and failing."

"Who'll handle the pool?" inquired Mr. Hansen.

"We'll handle it in the school," answered Jim.

"School's about done," objected Mr. Bronson.

"Won't the cream pool pretty near pay the expenses of running the school
all summer?" asked Bonner.

"We ought to run the school plant all the time," said Jim. "It's the only
way to get full value out of the investment. And we've corn-club work,
pig-club work, poultry work and canning-club work which make it very
desirable to keep in session with only a week's vacation. If you'll add
the cream pool, it will make the school the hardest working crowd in the
district and doing actual farm work, too. I like Mr. Bonner's
suggestion."

"Well," said Haakon Peterson, who had joined the group, "Ay tank we better
have a meeting of the board and discuss it."

"Well, darn it," said Columbus Brown, "I want in on this cream pool--and I
live outside the district!"

"We'll let you in, Clumb," said the colonel.

"Sure!" said Pete. "We hain't no more sense than to let any one in, Clumb.
Come in, the water's fine. We ain't proud!"

"Well," said Clumb, "if this feller is goin' to do school work of this
kind, I want in the district, too."

"We'll come to that one of these days," said Jim. "The district is too
small."

Wilbur Smythe's car stopped at the distant gate and honked for him--a
signal which broke up the party. Haakon Peterson passed the word to the
colonel and Mr. Bronson for a board meeting the next evening. The picnic
broke up in a dispersion of staid married couples to their homes, and
young folks in top buggies to dances and displays of fireworks in the
surrounding villages. Jim walked across the fields to his home--neither
old nor young, having neither sweetheart with whom to dance nor farm to
demand l