e walk, for she had been watching anxiously at each delivery. After all, it was the first time she had been away from home

er father on the night of her arriv

as possible to the home conditions there, Kit. You know, we have always lived somewhat of an easy-going life so far as discipline and set routine go, and consequently you girls have been brought up in a happy-go-lucky fashion. Do you remember what Emerson had inscribed over

nts, I think, putting in a good furnace, and enlarging the dining-room and kitchen. The veranda also will extend around three sides of the house inste

reat hickory fire burning in the outdoor veranda fireplace with the mystery of the night crooning low over the sleeping hills. Her mother's letter came next. Kit read

bjection to your staying for the winter term at Hope College. Between ourselves, dear, our plans are a little unsettled here. Father is certain that the house will be ready for us this winter, but you know we have kept from him any worry about financial matters, and I am afraid he figures on a wider latitude in expense

hool. You remember Mr. Howard, who came to look after our trees? He has been staying up at the Judge's, and took a great interest in Billie. Instead of going back to Blackwood Hall, Billie is go

he longing to break new trails, the starting of little colonies in clearings of one's own making. If there was

Roanoke, and had gone faring forth into the wilderness. This was Kit's favorite ancestor, John Carisbrook. He had wandered far through the west, and had married a girl in one of the outlying settlemen

w, in the earliest times, primitive people built their houses around some selected giant oak or other king of the forest, with the massive trunk itself upholding the structure. If she c

ly. Although from a western standpoint it was quite old, dating at least five years bef

xplorers. I just wish I could get Billie out here for a little while. He'll settle down in some old school that thinks it is

h Sandy crouching at her feet, she read the three letters from the girls. Jean's was full of plans for her coming trip to New York, She was not g

d as a hospital, and though I am dying to go, Dad and mother won't hear of it. Don't I wish I were twenty so I could do some Red Cr

he first few times she met a person. It took Kit a long time to really admit a stranger to her circle of selected ones, and she had never quite forgiven Stanley Howard for trespassing in the berry patch, even though it had been in the cause of science. Besides, the last year, Jean had seemed

material, Dav

he opening of school, and Dori

t what you think about it. I don't like descriptions in books, I like the t

und something new, and with each curio there went a story. Oddly enough, the Dean thawed more under Kit's persuasion when she begged for the stories than at any other time. After each meal, it was his custom to take what he called "four draws" in his study. Kit found at these times

gin in another week, and she was to enter the sophomore preparatory, which corresponded to the second year in high s

cting on the spur of the moment, she stepped around the co

d have suspected the gentleness of her tone, but the Dean looked over at her

think after all that we will begin with the geological periods. I wish you to get your d

ite fair. I mean in coming out here, and landing on you suddenly, without warning you I was a girl, and I want to make up to you for it in every possible way. I'll study bones and ruin

ent by nature, he had regarded Kit so far solely from the experimental standpoint. Since she had turned out to be a girl, he had decided to make the best of it, and at least try the eff

ou? If you don't I think I

referred a boy was because, well"-the Dean floundered,-"because scientists hold a consensus of opinion that through-hem-throug

m down home. Dad says that our land in Gilead is no good because it's been worked over and over, and it's all worn out, but if you plow deep

e Dean's lips, although it was more of a chuckl

you're going to

our family. Cousin Roxy says it's better to have a private burial lot well filled with ancestors than your name in the Social Register. But out west here it seems as if they either like you or not. Just when they first meet you, you're taken r

smiled whimsically when she saw the two. The Dean's pipe had gone out, and he was leaning over the desk listening as eagerly as though he had been a boy himself, while Kit, with her han