u there would be half the fun!"

"Oh, I guess I can," Allen began uncertainly. Then he continued: "But
you can just better believe if there is a chance in the world, I'll be
there."

"That's the way to talk," cried Mollie. "Now there is just one important
thing we haven't decided yet, girls, and that is, whom are we going to
have for a chaperon."

"I have been thinking of that, and I am sure I know just the one," said
Amy quietly; and they turned to her in amazement. Amy was like that, she
didn't talk much, but when she did, what she said was usually to the
point. "You all know young Mrs. Irving whose husband travels?"

"And she seems sort of lonely sometimes," Grace added, taking a
chocolate nut from a dish of candy that Mollie had placed, for Grace's
special delectation, on the table.

"Amy, you _are_ a wonder," said Mollie, regarding her chum with awe. "I
would never have thought of her in a thousand years, and of course she's
just the one."

"Well, now that the all-important question of chaperon is happily
settled," said Roy, veering back to the point like a compass, "suppose
we decide when to start."

After much discussion it was finally decided they were to start a week
from that day, which was Tuesday.

It was late when Mollie's guests started for home, and even then they
were all reluctant to go. As Allen stood on the porch of the Nelson home
a few minutes later, Betty turned to him impulsively.

"Oh, I do hope you will be able to go, Allen," she said.

"Would you be sorry if I didn't?" he asked her, eagerly.

"Why, of course."

"Then, I'll be there," he said, with a smile.

CHAPTER VII

CLOSED FOR REPAIRS

"Grace, Grace, do wake up!" Betty looked at her sleeping chum in
absolute amazement. How could anybody sleep so soundly on this, the day
of days, when one should have been awake at six o'clock thinking over
the delights in store!

Grace had come over the night before to talk over some minor details of
the outing, bringing with her a new and, she declared, a specially
delicious brand of chocolates. It had been so late when she had started
to leave that she had been prevailed upon to spend the night with Betty.
And so it was that on that eventful morning she lay slumbering
peacefully in the Little Captain's bed, defying all that impatient young
person's efforts to rouse her.

"Grace! Grace!" Betty cried again. "Won't you please wake up? Why, it's
seven o'clock this minute! We have