brook near their house
hurried down the slope into the valley as though it were late for a
night's engagement.

"Ruth," Barbara declared solemnly, "whatever happens to 'The Automobile
Girls,' one thing is certain, nothing can ever be lovelier than the weeks
we have spent together on this beautiful hill. Let us kiss all around.
Call Aunt Sallie. She must be a party to the agreement. We will never
forget our little log cabin--never, no, never, in all our lives."

CHAPTER XV

SOCIETY IN LENOX

"Miss Sallie, is Lenox the oldest summer resort in the United States?"
inquired Barbara, as they sat on a private veranda which opened into
their own sitting-room, in the most beautiful hotel in Lenox.

"I am sure I don't know, Bab, dear," Miss Sallie answered complacently.
"I think modern Lenox has been transformed by the wealth that has come
into the place in the last fifty years. I am told that it once had more
literary associations than any other town in the country. As Ruth tells
me you are ambitious to become a writer some day, this will interest you.
You girls must go about, while you are here, and see all the sights."

Barbara blushed and changed the subject. She did not like to talk of her
literary ambitions.

"Ruth and Mollie are late in getting back, aren't they?" she asked. "You
know they have gone over in the automobile to inquire for Eunice. I hope
they will be back in time for tea. Did Ruth remember to tell you that the
British Ambassador's daughters, Dorothy and Gwendolin Morton, are coming
in to tea? And perhaps Mr. Winthrop Latham and Reginald Latham will be
here also."

Miss Sallie nodded. "Yes; I am expecting them," she declared. "It is most
kind of them to call on us so promptly. I was afraid we would know no one
in Lenox, as I have no acquaintances here. I did not expect you and
little Mollie to pull friends down from the sky for us, as you seem to
have done by your rescue of Mr. Latham and his nephew. What a strange
thing life is!"

"Do you know, Miss Sallie," Barbara continued, "it seems awfully funny
for Mollie and me to to be associating with such important people as the
daughters of the English Ambassador. I am even impressed with that funny
little German Secretary, Franz Heller, just because he is attached to the
German Embassy. It makes me feel as though I were a character in a book,
to even meet such clever people. Dear me, what a lot you and Ruth have
done for us!"

"Barbara, dear,