tart tomorrow. Didn't I
tell you that dad and Billy are going to drive down to meet you?"

Mrs. O'Brien stood up. "Make your mind easy, Jarge. Rosie'll be ready on
time. I'll go in this minute and do that washin' now, and the things'll
be all dry and ready for ironin' by early mornin'."

Rosie gasped. "Why, Ma, it's going on ten o'clock!"

"Rosie dear, I don't care what o'clock it's going on. If it's the last
mortal thing I ever do for you, I'm going to do that washin' tonight,
for, if I do say it, ye're the best child that ever trod shoe-leather."

Jamie O'Brien's tilted chair came down on the porch floor with a thud,
while Jamie remarked solemnly: "You're right, Maggie; she is!"

Mrs. O'Brien moved toward the door. "Come on, Rosie dear, and help me
gather the things."

Rosie started up, then paused to glance from one to another of them. In
the soft glow of the summer night she could see that they were all
looking at her with the same expression of love and tenderness. Rosie
choked. "I don't see why--everybody's--so kind--to me!"

She turned back to George. "And I've been just horrible to you, Jarge!
You'll forgive me, won't you? I guess it was the weather."

"Aw, go on!" George spoke with a gruffness that deceived nobody. "I
guess it's been the weather with all of us!"

CHAPTER XXIII

HOME AGAIN

George Riley protested vigorously: "But I tell you she's only a little
girl and she's got a baby and a big basket and I don't know how many
other things and some one's just got to help her!"

With anxious headshakes Terence and Janet McFadden corroborated all
George Riley said, but the gatekeeper was firm. "Only passengers this
side the fence," he repeated.

So the three friends had to wait while the long train slowly disgorged.
Terence stood guard on one side of the gate, George Riley on the other,
while Janet pressed a tense searching face through the bars of the high
division fence. The first arrivals were the dapper quick young men with
new leather bags and walking-sticks who, in their eagerness to arrive,
always drop off a train before it stops. After them came more men and
the more agile of the women passengers. Then the general rush and crush:
the fussy people laden down with parcels; old ladies struggling to
protect their small handbags from the assaults of porters; distracted
mothers jerking their broods hither and thither; middle-aged men
murmuring to wives and daughters, "No rush! No rush! Pl