rrit to shoulder the whole work."

"The Harmons are coming down to the rancho some time to-day to say
good-by to Jack; you know they are leaving for New York in the morning,"
Jean interposed, feeling conscience-smitten, but anxious to escape a
scolding.

All this time Frieda had been silent, but now she clapped her hands
together so suddenly that she made everybody in the room start. "I have
a perfectly lovely idea," she announced. "Let's give Jack a surprise
party. We need not ask any outside people except the Harmons, for poor
Jack can't dance or play many games any more, but she will like the
surprise, I know."

Ruth leaned over and kissed Frieda, and there was a moment of silence.
The girls were thinking that money would mean very little to any one of
them if Jack did not regain her strength.

"It's a beautiful plan, Frieda," Jean answered at last, with hot cheeks.
"We will stay at home to-day and decorate the rancho so no one will know
it to-night. I suppose it will be nice to have a farewell party for the
Harmons. We ought not to show that we have any feeling against them, but
it is pretty hard," she concluded.

"Jack does not believe that Elizabeth or Donald or Mrs. Harmon knew why
Mr. Harmon wanted to buy our ranch," Ruth interposed.

"Donald Harmon knew," Olive interrupted quietly, but no one could
persuade her to say how she had found this out.

By half-past seven the front of the rancho was hung with Japanese
lanterns. On the old divan in the sitting room Jack was enthroned like
an Oriental princess, with her blue crepe shawl draped over a blue
muslin gown and a wreath of red roses in her coronet of gold hair.

Peter Drummond had at last returned to his home in New York without
paying a visit to the ranch, but never a week passed that he did not
send a large box of red roses to Jack with a letter urging her to hurry
to New York.

The girls had decided to have a fancy dress party, and, as there was no
time for preparation, their costumes were an odd assortment of all the
odds and ends they could find. Early in the day, when Jack guessed that
something unusual was to take place, Ruth decided that she would enjoy
the preparations more than the surprise. So it was she who helped dress
Olive, who never looked so lovely in her life. Quite by accident her odd
costume exactly suited her. She wore a simple white dress, with a short
jacket of gold embroidery, and a round, gold-embroidered cap on her
loose bl