coming.
We're used to the boys just dropping in informally. We like it so much
better that way."

Pink stopped to reply to that, hesitated with his hand on the knob, and
leaning against the door, made some remark about the weather. It was
evident that he was fixed to stay until the clock struck again.

Mary reached up to the match-safe hanging near the door and handed him a
match. "I wish you'd scratch this as you go out, and see how the
thermometer stands. It's hanging on the post just at the right hand of
the porch steps. Call back what it registers, please. Thirty-six? Oh,
thank you! I'm sure there'll be frost before morning. Good night."

She closed the door and came back into the room, pretending to swoon
against Jack, who shook her, exclaiming laughingly, "I think that was a
frost, right now."

Just then, Norman, who had disappeared an hour earlier, cautiously
opened the door of his bedroom a crack. He was clad in his pajamas.
Seeing that the coast was clear he thrust out a dishevelled head and
recited dramatically:

"'Parting is such sweet sorrow
I fain would say goodnight until it be to-morrow.'"

Mary blinked at him sleepily, saying with a yawn, "Let this be a lesson
to you, son. You can take this from your Uncle Jerry, that there is no
social grace more to be desired than the ability to make a nimble and
graceful exit when the proper time comes."

As she turned out her light, later, she said to herself, "I'm glad I
don't have to look forward to a whole lifetime in Lone-Rock. One such
evening is pleasant enough, but a whole winter of them would be
dreadful." Then she went to sleep and dreamed that her little fleet of
boats had all come home from sea, each one so heavily laden with
treasure that she did not know which cargo to draw in first.

CHAPTER III

A NEW FRIEND

Although some of the applications which Mary sent out did not have as
far to travel as the first one, she did not count on hearing from any of
them within two weeks. However, it was to no fortnight of patient
waiting that she settled down. She threw herself into such an orgy of
preparations for leaving home, that the days flew around like the wheels
of a squirrel cage.

She could not afford any new clothes, but everything in her wardrobe was
rejuvenated as far as possible, and a number of things entirely
remodelled. One by one they were folded away in her trunk until
everything was so shipshape that sh