for being apart so long."

And so, with tears and laughter mingling together, Bee rejoiced. A
meadow lark flew, across the road, alighted on a twig and sang to them.
An oriole peeped at them saucily from his perch on a near-by tree, then
whistled playfully, "Sweet, do you hear? Sweet, sweet, do you hear?" And
Bee threw back her head caught his note, and answered joyfully, "I hear.
I hear. Sweet, sweet."

"How much Uncle William thinks of you, Bee," observed Adele presently.
"And he seems to be so pleased with your mind. Scientific people think
so much of intellect, don't they?"

"I wonder if they do?" mused Bee. "I don't believe that they are much
different from other people. And after all it is not my mind that is
bringing him home, but my picture. Oh, I wish that I had sent it long
ago."

Adele winced. "He'll find you awfully clever, Bee."

"You dear!" exclaimed Bee leaning forward to kiss her. "You are just as
sweet as you are pretty."

"Sue Ford said the other day that I was sweet because I did not have
sense enough to be anything else," observed Adele.

"The mean thing!" cried Bee. "Sue says lots of things, although I am
glad that she said what she did about father's not knowing me. If she
had not said that I would have thought that my picture was not good
enough to send, and father wouldn't be coming home. Still, I don't like
her saying that you have no sense."

"Oh, I don't mind," said Adele, biting a blade of grass meditatively.
After all, it did not matter so much about the picture. When her Uncle
William came she would tell them that she did it for fun, and they would
have a good laugh. Bee wouldn't mind at all when her father was really
with her. So, quite restored to her usual complacency, she continued; "I
know that I am not clever like you, or Sue, or some of the other girls;
and when I see how worried you get over your examinations I am glad that
I'm not. Bee, does Uncle William know that you have studied up
butterflies?"

"No; I was going to tell him when I answered this letter. I expect that
he will laugh at my specimens. Dear father!"

She lingered over the word as though she liked to say it. All at once
she rose with a little cry. "We must go home, Adele. Aunt Annie ought to
know about father at once, so that she can make the necessary
arrangements about going to Walnut Grove. To think of being in my own
home with my own father so soon!"

"Bee," said Adele slipping her arm through her co