The oldest Corner House girl was becoming a modern as well as an enthusiastic housekeeper. She read and studied not a little in domestic science and had been even before they came to live in Milton a good, plain cook. Mr. Howbridge had once called her "Martha" because she was so cumbered with domestic cares. Ruth, however, had within her a sincere love for household details.

Mrs. MacCall, who was almost as sparing of praise as Aunt Sarah at most times, considered Ruth a wonder.

"She'll mak' some mannie a noble wife," the Scotch woman declared, with both pride and admiration in "Our Ruth."

"But he'll not deserve her," snapped Aunt Sarah, rather in disparagement of any man, however, than in praise of Ruth.

Now that Luke and his sister were gone, the housekeeper watched Ruth more keenly, even, than before. The good woman was evidently amazed, after the close association of Ruth and Luke, that nothing had come of it.

If the eldest of the four Kenway sisters felt any disappointment because Luke Shepard had gone away without saying anything in private to her regarding his hopes and aspirations, she showed none of that disappointment in her manner or appearance.

Save that she seemed more sedate than ever.

That might be natural enough, however. Even Mrs. MacCall admitted that Ruth was growing up.

"And I should like to know if we're not all growing up?" Agnes demanded, overhearing Mrs. MacCall repeat the above statement. Agnes had come down into the kitchen on Monday morning, ready for school.

"I should say we were! Ruth won't let me 'hoo-hoo' from the window to Neale for him to come and take my books. Says it isn't ladylike, and that I am too old for such tomboy tricks. So," and the roguish beauty whispered this, "I am under the necessity of climbing the back fence into Mr. Con Murphy's yard to get at Neale," and she ran off to put this threat into immediate execution.

CHAPTER XX

The Kenways had suffered enough in poverty in the past. He knew all about their hard life after Mr. Kenway had died, for Ruth had told him of it herself. Until Luke could get into business after his college days were ended and make good, he would have little to offer Ruth Kenway of either luxuries or comforts.

So, the young fellow told himself, it all depended upon Neighbor Northrup, who had promised to do so much for him, provided Luke gave no sign of desiring the company of a wife through life.

"He's just a ridiculous, crabbed old man," Luke told himself. "I never paid much attention to Neighbor's crotchets before I met Ruth. Didn't suppose I'd ever really care enough about a girl to risk displeasing him.

"Of course, he's been awfully kind to me—and promises to be kinder. I believe I am named in his will. Yet, I wonder if it's much to brag of for a fellow with all his limbs sound, presumably his share of brains, and all that, to be expecting a lift-up in the world. Maybe I'm rather leaning back on the old gentleman's promises instead of looking ahead to paddling my own canoe. Anyway I'm not going to spoil my whole life just because of such nonsense."

Luke Shepard felt immensely superior at this time to Mr. Northrup with his crotchets and foibles. The latter's rooted objection to women seemed to the young collegian the height of folly.

Aunt Lorena's was quite a little house beside Mr. Henry Northrup's abode. Whereas the flower-beds, and hedge, and the climbing roses about the spinster's cottage made a pleasant picture, the old Northrup house was somber indeed. The bachelor's dwelling, with its padlocked front gate, did not look cheerful enough to attract even a book agent.

For some years Luke had spent quite as much time on Neighbor's premises as he had with his aunt and Cecile. There were many little things he could do for the old man that the latter could not hire done. Samri, as the Japanese butler was called, could not do everything.

Arriving at Grantham in the late afternoon, Luke stopped only a moment to greet Aunt Lorena before hurrying across the line fence into Neighbor's yard.

"For the good land's sake!" sighed Miss Shepard, who was very precise, if not dictatorial, "it does seem as though that boy might stay with us a minute. Off he has to go at once to Neighbor. You would think they were sweethearts—Luke and that crabbed old fellow."

Cecile winced. "Luke has something on his mind, Auntie—something that he thinks he must tell Neighbor at once," and she, too, sighed. "Oh, dear! how it is all coming out I really don't know. I am almost sorry we went to the Kenways' to visit."

"Why, Cecile! didn't they treat you nicely?"

"Splendidly. They are all dears—especially Ruthie. But it is because of her I am worried."

"Indeed?"

"She and Luke have become very friendly—oh, entirely too friendly, if nothing is to come of it."

Aunt Lorena dearly loved a romance. Her eyes began to sparkle and a faint flush came into her withered cheek.

"You don't mean it, Sissy!" she gasped. "Not our Luke? The dear boy! Think of his having a sweetheart!"

"Oh, but I don't know that he has one! I am afraid he ought not even to think of it!" cried Cecile.

"Nonsense! Why not? Your father was married when he was no older than Luke. And of course the dear boy would wait till he graduates."

"And for a long time after, I fear," said Cecile, shaking her head. She really saw the folly of such an idea much more quickly than Aunt Lorena.

"Is this Ruth Kenway a nice girl?" queried Aunt Lorena eagerly. "And is Luke actually fond of her?"

"As fond as he can be I do believe," admitted the sister, still shaking her head.

"And—and do you suppose Miss Kenway appreciates our Luke?"

"I guess she likes him," said Cecile, smiling a little at the question. "I am sure she does, in fact. But Luke will say nothing to her unless Neighbor agrees."

"Mercy! He's not gone to tell that old man about the girl?"

"Of course."

"Well! Of all things! The ridiculous boy!" ejaculated Aunt Lorena. "He might know that Mr. Northrup will be greatly vexed. Why, he hates women!"

"Yes, I am afraid Luke will have a bad time with Neighbor," said Cecile, anxiously.

She was quite right in her supposition. Luke Shepard appeared before the grim old man as the latter sat in his study and, being a perfectly candid youth, he blurted out his news without much preparation. Immediately after shaking hands, and asking after Mr. Northrup's health, he said:

"Neighbor, I've got a great secret to tell you."

"Heh? A secret? What is it? Broke somebody's window, have you?" for his elderly friend often seemed to think Luke still a small boy.

"That wouldn't be a great secret," the young man said quietly. "No. It is the greatest thing that's ever come into my life."

The old man, who could look very sternly indeed from under his heavy brows, gazed now with apprehension at his young friend.

"You don't mean you think you've changed your mind about your college work?"

"No, sir. But there is one thing I want to do after I get through college that I never thought of doing before."

"What's the matter with you, boy?" demanded Mr. Northrup, exasperated.

"You know I have been away with Cecile to see some friends of ours. And one of them, Miss Kenway—Ruth—is the nicest girl I ever met."

"A girl!" literally snorted Neighbor.

"Ruth Kenway is splendid," said Luke firmly. "She is lovely. And—and I think very, very much of her."

"What do you mean, boy?" the old man demanded, his deep-set eyes fairly flashing. "Why do you tell me about any silly girl? Don't you know that it offends me? I can, and do, endure your speaking of your sister. It is not your fault you have a sister. But it will be your fault if you ever allow yourself to become entangled with any other woman."

"But, Neighbor," said the young man desperately, "I couldn't help it. I tell you I admire Ruth Kenway immensely—immensely! I want to make her care for me, too. I want— I want—"

"The moon!" roared Mr. Northrup. "That's what you are crying for—like any baby. And you'll not get it—neither the moon nor the girl. What have I always told you? If you are fool enough to get mixed up with any girl, I wash my hands of you. Understand?"

"Yes," said Luke, flushing deeply during this tirade but holding his own temper admirably in check. "Yes, I understand. But I'd like to talk with you about it—"

"You can't talk to me about any girl!"

"But I must," insisted Luke. "You see, I—I love her. And if I can possibly do it, I am going to win her for a wife—some day."

The old gentleman arose in anger.

"Do you mean to stand there and deliberately defy me?"

"I am not defying you, Neighbor; I'm only telling you," Luke said, rather doggedly, it must be confessed. But his own eyes were glowing.

"After my declaration to you that I will have nothing more to do with you if you fool with any girls—"

"I'm not!" snapped Luke. "It is only one girl. The best girl in the world. I wish you'd go to Milton to see her."

"Go to Milton? Indeed! I wouldn't go there—"

He stopped and glowered at Luke for a moment without speaking. Then he asked harshly:

"So this girl lives in Milton?"

"Yes, sir. At the old Corner House. And she is lovely—"

"Be still!" commanded the old man. "Young calf! Do you suppose I am interested in your protestations of silliness about a girl! I want to hear nothing more about it. You understand my wishes well enough. I will never do a thing for you after you graduate— I will strike you out of my will— I'll close my door against you, if you entangle yourself in any way with this girl."

"Oh, Neighbor!" murmured Luke sadly, stepping back from the old man's wildly gesturing arm.

"I mean it. I always mean what I say," declared Mr. Northrup. "You should know me well enough by this time. A girl—faugh! You trouble me any more about this girl—or any other—and I'll have nothing more to do with you."

"Very well, Mr. Northrup. Good-bye," said Luke, and turned toward the door.

"Where are you going, you young whippersnapper!" roared the old man.

"I have made up my mind. I will win Ruth if I can—though with my poor prospects I have no right to speak to her now. But it would not be right, when you feel as you do, for me to accept any further favors from you when I am determined in my heart to get Ruth in spite of you."

The door closed quietly behind him before the old man could utter another word. He stared at the door, then sat down slowly and his face lost its angry color.

Mr. Henry Northrup was apparently both pained and amazed. Perhaps he was mostly confused because Luke Shepard had taken him quite at his word.

CHAPTER XXI

"You sh'd train your stomach to be your clock, child," Mrs. MacCall declared on this occasion, after Dot had finally mustered up her courage to ask for the lunch.

"I try to, Mrs. Mac," said the smallest Corner House girl apologetically. "But sometimes my stomach's fast."

That started the ball rolling that evening, and the dinner table proved to be a hilarious place. But Ruth was very quiet and her countenance carried a serious cast that might have been noticed had the others not all been so gay and excited. The first day of the term is always an exciting time. Everything about the school—even old things—seems strange.

Dot had of course learned to write as well as to read; and indeed she wrote a very plain and readable hand. Even Mrs. MacCall could see it "without her specs."

"I do abominate these folks whose handwriting is so fine that I have to run to get my glasses to know whether it's an invitation to tea or to tell me some bad news," the housekeeper declared, in discussing Dot's improved writing.

The little girl was passing around a paper on which she had copied a sentence that her teacher had written on the blackboard just before closing hour that day. With an idea of testing the children's knowledge of English, the teacher had written the line and told her class to think it over and, in the morning, bring her the sentence rewritten in different words, but retaining the original meaning.

It was the old proverb: "A wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse."

"Of course, I know what it means," Dot said. "If a horse is blind he wouldn't see you nodding or winking. And winking isn't polite, anyway—Ruth says it isn't."

"Correct, Dottums," Agnes agreed. "It is very bad and bold to wink—especially at the boys."

"Wouldn't it be impolite to wink at a horse, too, Aggie?" asked the puzzled Dot. "Don't you think Scalawag would feel he was insulted if I wunk at him?"

"Oh, my eye!" gasped Neale, who chanced to be at hand. "Wink, wank, wunk. Great declension, kid."

"Don't call me 'kid'!" cried Dot. "I am sure that is not polite, Neale O 'Neil."

"Discovered, Neale!" chuckled Agnes.

"You are right, Dottie," said the boy, with a twinkle in his eye. "And to repay you for my slip in manners, I will aid you in transposing that sentence so that your teacher will scarcely recognize it."

And he did so. It greatly delighted Dot, for she did so love polysyllables. The other members of the family were convulsed when they read Neale's effort. The little girl carried the paper to school the next day and the amazed teacher read the following paraphrase of "A wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse:"

"A spasmodic movement of the eye is as adequate as a slight motion of the cranium to an equine quadruped devoid of its visionary capacities."

"Goodness!" Tess declared when she had heard this read over several times. "I don't think you would better read that to Scalawag, Dot. It would make any horse mad."

"Scalawag isn't a horse," responded her sister. "He's a pony. And Neale says he'll never grow up to be a horse. He's just always going to be our cute, cunning little Scalawag!"

"But suppose," sighed Tess, thoughtfully, "that he ever acts like that brown pony of Mrs. Heard's. Jonas, you know."

"Oh, Jonas! He is a bad pony. He gets stuck and won't go," Dot said. "Our Scalawag wouldn't do that."

"He balks, Dot—balks," reproved Tess. "He doesn't get stuck."

"I don't care. You can't push him, and you can't pull him. He just stands."

"Until our Neale whispers something in his ear," suggested Tess.

"Oh, my!" exclaimed her little sister. "Suppose Scalawag should be taken that way. What would we do? We don't know what Neale whispered to Mrs. Heard's pony."

"That's so," agreed Tess. "And Neale won't tell me. I've asked him, and asked him! He was never so mean about anything before."

But Neale, with a reassuring smile, told the little girls that Scalawag would never need to be whispered to. In fact, whispering to the calico pony would merely be a waste of time.

"There's nothing the matter with the old villain but inborn laziness," the youth chuckled. "You have to shout to Scalawag, not whisper to him."

"Oh!" murmured Tess, "don't call him a villain. He is so pretty."

"And cute," added Dot.

Uncle Rufus had built him a nice box stall and Neale took time early each morning to brush and curry the pony until his coat shone and his mane was "crinkly."

Before the week was out, too, the basket phaeton arrived and a very pretty russet, nickel-trimmed harness. Even the circus trimmings had never fitted Scalawag better than this new harness, and he tossed his head and pawed, as he had been trained to do, arching his neck and looking just as though he were anxious to work.

"But it's all in his looks," observed Neale. "He doesn't mean it."

Which seemed to be the truth when the two little girls and Sammy Pinkney got into the phaeton with Neale and took their first drive about the more quiet residential streets of Milton.

Scalawag jogged along under compulsion; but to tell the truth he acted just as though, if he had his own choice, he would never get out of a walk.

"Je-ru-sa-lem!" muttered Sammy. "It's lucky we don't want to go anywhere in a hurry."

It was great fun to drive around the Parade Ground and see the other children stare. When Sammy was allowed to hold the lines he sat up like a real coachman and was actually too proud for speech.

The responsibilities of his position immediately impressed the embryo pirate. Neale taught him carefully how to drive, and what to do in any emergency that might arise. Scalawag was an easy-bitted pony and minded the rein perfectly. The only danger was the pony's slowness in getting into action.

"I reckon," declared Neale, with some disgust, "if there was a bomb dropped behind him, old Scalawag wouldn't get out of the way quick enough, even if there was a five-minute time fuse on the bomb."

"Well, I guess he'll never run away then," said Tess, with a sigh of satisfaction. Nothing could be said about Scalawag that one or the other of the two little girls could not find an excuse for, or even that the criticism was actually praise.

"One thing you want to remember, children," Neale said one day, earnestly. "If you're ever out with Scalawag without me, and you hear a band playing, or anything that sounds like a band, you turn him around and beat it the other way."

"All right," responded the little girls.

"What for?" asked Sammy, at once interested.

"Never mind what for. You promise to do as I say, or it's all off. You'll get no chance to drive the girls alone."

"Sure, I'll do what you say, Neale. Only I wondered what for. Don't he like band music?"

But Neale, considering it safer to say nothing more, merely repeated his warning.

The children drove out every pleasant afternoon when school was over, and within the fortnight Sammy and Tess and Dot were going about Milton with the pony through the shady and quiet streets, as though they had always done so. Therefore the older Corner House girls and Neale could take their friends to drive in the motor-car, without crowding in the two smaller children.

The "newness" of the automobile having worn off for Tess and Dot, they much preferred the basket carriage and the fat pony. They, too, could take their little friends driving, and this added a feeling of importance to their pleasure in the pony.

Had Tess had her way every sick or crippled child in town would have ridden behind the calico pony. She wanted at once to go to the Women's and Children's Hospital, where their very dear friend, Mrs. Eland, had been matron and for the benefit of which The Carnation Countess had been given by the school children of Milton, and take every unfortunate child, one after another, out in the basket carriage.

Their schoolmates especially had to be invited to ride, and Sadie Goronofsky from Meadow Street, and Alfredia Blossom, Uncle Rufus' granddaughter, were not neglected.

"I do declare!" said Aunt Sarah, with some exasperation, as she saw the pony and cart, with its nondescript crew, start off one afternoon for a jog around the Parade Ground. "I do declare! What riffraff Tess manages to pick up. For she certainly must be the biggest influence in gathering every rag, tag and bobtail child in the neighborhood. I never did see such a youngster."

"It isn't that Tessie's tastes are so heterodox," Ruth said, smiling quietly, "but her love for others is so broad."

"Humph!" snapped Aunt Sarah. "It's a wonder to me the child hasn't brought smallpox into the family from going as she does to those awful tenements on Meadow Street."

Aunt Sarah had always been snobbish in her tendencies, even in her days of poverty; and since she enjoyed the comforts and luxuries of the old Corner House it must be confessed that this unpleasant trait in the old woman's character had been considerably developed.

"The only tenements she goes to on Meadow Street are our own," Ruth replied with vigor. "If they are conducted so badly that diseases become epidemic there, we shall be to blame—shall we not?"

"Oh, don't talk socialism or political economy to me!" said Aunt Sarah. "Thank goodness when I went to school young girls did not fill their heads with such nonsense."

"But when she went to school," Ruth said afterward to Mrs. MacCall, "girls I am sure learned to be charitable and loving. And that is all our Tess is, after all."

"Bless her sweet heart!" exclaimed the housekeeper. "She'll never be hurt by that, it's true. But she does bring awfully queer looking characters to the hoose, Ruth. There's no gainsaying that."

As the children met these other children at the public school, Ruth could not see why the Goronofskys and the Maronis and the Tahnjeans, and even Petunia Blossom's pickaninnies, should not, if they were well behaved, come occasionally to the old Corner House. Nor did she forbid her little sisters taking their schoolmates to ride in the basket phaeton, for the calico pony could easily draw all that could pile into the vehicle.

The children from Meadow Street, and from the other poorer quarters of the town, always appeared at the Kenway domicile dressed in their best, and scrubbed till their faces shone. The parents considered it an honor for their children to be invited over by Tess and Dot.

Sammy, of course, would have found it much more agreeable to drive alone with some of the boys than with a lot of the little girls; but he was very fair about it.

"I can't take you 'nless Tess says so," he said to Iky Goronofsky. "I'm only let to drive this pony; I don't own him. Tess and Dot have the say of it."

"And all the kids is sponging on them," grunted Iky, who always had an eye to the main chance. "You know what I would do if the pony was mine?"

"What would you do, Iky?" asked Sammy.

"I'd nefer let a kid in the cart without I was paid a nickel. Sure! A nickel a ride! And I would soon make the cost of the harness and the cart. That's what my father would do too."

Both of which statements were probably true. But the little Corner House girls had no thought for business. They were bent upon having a good time and giving their friends pleasure.

The pony was not being abused in any sense. The work was good for him. But possibly Uncle Bill Sorber had not looked forward to quite such a busy time for Scalawag when he told him in confidence that he was going to have an easy time of it at the old Corner House. If Scalawag could have seen, and been able to speak with, the old ringmaster just then the pony would doubtless have pointed out an important error in the above statement.

Scalawag was petted and fed and well cared for. But as the fall weather was so pleasant, each afternoon he was put between the shafts and was made to haul noisy, delighted little folk about the Parade Ground.

They did not always have company in these drives, however. Sometimes only Tess and Dot were in the basket carriage, though usually Sammy was along. Once in a while they went on errands for Mrs. MacCall—to the store, or to carry things to sick people. The clatter of Scalawag's little hoofs became well known upon many of the highways and byways of Milton.

Once they drove to the Women's and Children's Hospital with a basket of home-made jellies and jams that Mrs. MacCall had just put up and which Ruth wished to donate to the convalescents in the institution. For after the departure of Mrs. Eland and her sister, Miss Peperill, for the West, the Corner House Girls had not lost their interest in this charitable institution.

At a corner which they were approaching at Scalawag's usual jog trot were several carriages, a hearse with plumes, and some men in uniform. Sammy had the reins on this day.

"Oh, Sammy," said Tess, "we'll have to wait, I guess. It's Mr. Mudge's funeral—Mr. Peter Mudge, you know. He was a Grand Army man, and all the other Grand Army men will help bury him. There! Hear the band!"

Of a sudden, and with a moaning of wind instruments punctuated by the roll of drums, the band struck into a dirge. The procession moved. And all of a sudden Sammy found that Scalawag was marking time just as he had been taught to do in the circus ring to any music.

"Oh, my!" gasped Dot, "what is the matter with Scalawag?"

"Turn him around, Sammy—please do," begged Tess. "Just see him! And he's following the band."

That is just exactly what the pony intended to do. Sammy could not turn him. He would mind neither voice nor the tugging rein. Arching his neck, tossing his mane, and stepping high in time to the droning music, the calico pony turned the corner and followed on at the rear of the procession.

"Why—why," gasped Dot, "I don't want to go to a funeral. You stop him, Sammy Pinkney."

"Can't we turn him up a side street, Sammy?" whispered Tess.

Everybody was looking from the sidewalk and from the houses they passed. It was a ridiculous situation. The solemn, slow notes of the band seemed just suited to Scalawag's leisurely action. He kept perfect time.

"And they're goin' to march clear out to the Calvary Cemetery!" ejaculated Sammy. "It's four miles!"

CHAPTER XXII

The situation was becoming tragic. The thought of the pleasures of scraping the ice-cream freezer paddles was enough to make Sammy turn to desperate invention for release.

"Here, Tess," he commanded. "You hold these reins and don't you let 'em get under Scalawag's heels."

"Oh, Sammy! what are you going to do?" queried Tess excitedly, but obeying him faithfully.

"I'm going to slide out behind and run around and stop him."

"Oh, Sammy! You can't!" Dot cried. "He'll just walk right over you. See him!"

Everybody along the street was laughing now. It really was a funny sight to see that solemnly stepping pony right behind the line of carriages. Sammy would not be deterred. He scrambled out of the phaeton and ran around to Scalawag's head.

"Whoa! Stop, you old nuisance!" ejaculated the boy, seizing the bridle and trying to halt the pony.

But the latter knew his business. He had been taught to keep up his march as long as the band played. If it had suddenly changed to a lively tune, Scalawag would have stood right up on his hind legs and pawed the air!

Therefore, the pony had no idea of stopping while the band played on. He pushed ahead and Sammy had to keep stepping backward or be trod on. It was a funny sight indeed to see the small boy try to hold back the fat pony that plowed along just as though Sammy had no more weight than a fly.

"Oh Sammy! he'll step on you," Tess cried.

"Oh, Sammy! he'll—he'll bite you," gasped Dot.

"Oh, Sammy!" bawled a delighted youngster from the sidewalk, "he'll swaller you whole!"

"Look out for that pony, boy!" called an old man.

"What's the kid trying to do—wrastle him?" laughed another man.

Tess' cheeks were very, very red. Sammy wished that the street might open and swallow him. Dot was too young to feel the smart of ridicule quite so keenly. She hugged up the Alice-doll to her bosom and squealed just as loud as she could.

After all, Dot was the one who saved the situation. Her shrill cry was heard by an old gentleman in the last carriage. He was a very grand looking old gentleman indeed, for when he stood up to look down upon the obstinate pony and the small boy struggling with him, as well as the two little girls in the basket phaeton, they saw that he had medals and ribbons on his breast and a broad sash across the front of his coat.

"Halt!" commanded General MacKenzie, and although he was at the rear of the procession instead of the front, the word was passed swiftly along to the band, and everybody stood still, while the droning of the instruments ceased.

Instantly Scalawag stopped keeping time, and shook his head and coughed. Sammy had pulled at his bit so hard that it interfered with the pony's breathing.

"What under the sun's the matter with that little pony?" demanded the veteran officer, putting on his eyeglasses the better to see Scalawag and the whole outfit.

"If you pl-please, sir," stammered Sammy, "he belongs to a circus and—and he just can't make his feet behave when he hears a band."

"And do you children belong to a circus, too?" asked the old gentleman in vast surprise.

"Oh, no, sir," Tess put in. "And Scalawag doesn't belong to one now. But he can't forget. If you'll have your band wait, please, until we can drive up this other street, Scalawag will forget all about it."

"Please do, sir," begged Dot. "For we don't really want to go to the seminary; we go to school here in Milton," which peculiar association of ideas rather stagged General MacKenzie.

However, amid the subdued hilarity of the people on the sidewalks, Sammy managed at last to turn Scalawag's head and drive him up Buchan Terrace, and out of hearing of the droning of the band when the funeral procession started again. But it certainly was a memorable occasion for the little mistresses of Scalawag and for Sammy.

Thereafter, when they were driving out, they were continually on the watch for a band, or any other music; and Dot even feared that the old man on the corner who attracted attention to his infirmities, as well as to the pencils he sold, with a small organette, would play some tune that would remind Scalawag of his circus days.

Neale O'Neil would sometimes bring the pony around to the front of the house and have Agnes start a band record on the music machine in the parlor. Immediately Scalawag would try to go through his old tricks to the delight of the neighborhood children.

"Well! it doesn't much matter, I suppose," Ruth sighed. "Every day is circus day at the old Corner House. We have gained a reputation for doing queer things, and living not at all like other folks. I wonder that nice people here in Milton allow their children to play with our little girls."

"Hech!" exclaimed Mrs. MacCall. "I should like to know why not? They're the best behaved bairns anywhere, if their heids are fu' o' maggots," using the word, however, in the meaning of "crotchets" or "queer ideas."

Ruth was no "nagger." She was strict about some things with the smaller ones; but she never interfered with their plays or amusements as long as they were safe and did not annoy anybody. And with their multitude of pets and toys, to say nothing of dolls galore, Tess and Dot Kenway were as happy little girls as could be found in a day's march.

Besides, there was always Sammy Pinkney to give them a jolt of surprise; although Sammy's mother said he was behaving this term almost like an angel and she feared a relapse of the fever he had suffered the spring before.

Neale O'Neil felt of the boy's shoulder blades solemnly and pronounced no sign yet of sprouting wings.

"You are in no danger of dying young because of your goodness striking in, Sammy," he said. "Don't lose heart."

"Aw—you!" grunted Sammy.

Ruth, seeing the practicability of it, was taking lessons in driving the automobile and was to get a license shortly. Agnes felt quite put out that she was not allowed to do likewise; but to tell the truth the older folk feared to let the fly-away sister handle the car without Neale, or somebody more experienced, in the seat with her.

"I don't care, Neale has killed a hen, scared innumerable dogs sleeping in the road-dust, and come near running down Mrs. Privett. You know he has! I believe I wouldn't do much worse."

Ruth pointed out that she need not do much worse in Mrs. Privett's case to have a very bad accident indeed.

"The difference between almost running a person down, and actually hitting him, can be measured only before a magistrate," the older sister said.

Ruth took her lessons from the man at the garage after luncheon, for she did not attend school in the afternoon this term, taking the few studies she desired in the morning.

One afternoon she drove over to Mr. Howbridge's house for tea, and as the car jounced over the railroad crossing at Pleasant Street she suddenly spied a familiar looking object bobbing along the sidewalk. It was a huge green umbrella, and beneath it was the rather shambling figure of the old gentleman whom she had saved from possible accident at this very crossing some weeks before.

He was dressed quite as he had been when Ruth first saw him. If he saw her, the car passed so rapidly that she did not see him bow. At Mr. Howbridge's house she lingered for some time, for the lawyer always enjoyed these little visits of his oldest ward.

Ruth did not return to the old Corner House until almost time for the children to come home from school. Mrs. MacCall was in an excited state when the oldest Corner House girl appeared.

"Hech, ma lassie!" cried the housekeeper. "Ye hae fair missed the crankiest old body I've set my eyes on in mony a day!"

"Whom do you mean, Mrs. Mac?" asked Ruth, in surprise.

"Let me tell 't ye! I should be fu' used to quare bodies coomin' here, for 'tis you bairns bring 'em. But this time 'twas ane o' your friends, Ruthie—"

"But who was he?"

"Fegs! He'd never tell 't me," Mrs. MacCall declared, shaking her head. "He juist kep' sayin' he had a reason for wishin' tae see ye. Ye could nae tell from lookin' into his winter-apple face, whether 'twas guid news or bad he brought."

"Oh, Mrs. Mac!" cried Ruth suddenly, "did he carry a green umbrella!"

"He did juist that," declared the woman, vigorously nodding. "And a most disreputable umbrella it looked tae be. 'Gin ye judged the mon by his umbrella, ye'd think he was come tae buy rags."

"Isn't he a character?" laughed Ruth.

"He's as inquisitive as a chippin'-sparrow," said the housekeeper, with some disgust. "He wanted tae know ev'rything that had happened tae ye since ye was weaned."

"Oh, dear! I'm rather glad I wasn't here then."

"Aw, but fash not yerself he'll nae be back. For he wull."

"No!"

"Yes, I tell 't ye. I seen it in the gleam of his hard eye when he went. I gave him nae satisfaction as tae when ye might be home, not knowin' who he was nor what he wanted o' ye."

"Oh, Mrs. MacCall, don't you remember?" and Ruth recounted the incident at the railroad crossing nearly a month before.

"Huh, that's why he was so cur'ous, then. You saved his life," went on the housekeeper dropping the broad Scotch burr, now that her excitement was cooling.

"I don't know that I did. But perhaps he came to thank me for what I tried to do."

"It seems as though he must want to know every little thing about you," the housekeeper declared. "And how he could corner you with his questions! He should ha' made a lawyer-body. He made me tell him more than I should about the family's private affairs, I have no doot."

"Oh, Mrs Mac! what do you suppose he wants!"

"To see you, belike. And he'll be back again."

"Goodness! I'm not sure I want to talk with him. He looked very odd to me that day I met him. And so cross!"

"No doot of it. He's an ugly looking man. And from his speech it's easy to see he's no friend of womenkind."

"He must be like that Neighbor Cecile was telling us about," sighed Ruth and with that dropped the subject of the strange old man with the green umbrella.

Ruth had heard from Cecile Shepard since she had gone back to the preparatory school—in fact, had received two letters. They were not such bright epistles as Cecile usually wrote; but they were full of her brother. Not that Cecile mentioned Luke's differences with Neighbor, or the reason thereof; but she seemed unable to keep from writing about Luke.

Ruth was secretly as anxious to hear about the young man as his sister was to write about him.

Ruth was heart-hungry. She felt that Luke might have taken her into his confidence to a greater degree; and yet she suspected why he had not done so.

Mr. Howbridge's talk of dowries for the sisters was always in Ruth's mind. Of course, she knew that the Stower estate was rapidly increasing in value. In a few years property that Peter Stower had purchased for a song would be worth a fortune. The Kenways were likely to be very rich.

What if Luke Shepard had no money when he graduated from college? That seemed a very small thing to Ruth. She would have plenty when she came of age, and why could not her money set Luke up in some line of business that he was fitted for?

Yet, there was a whisper in her heart that told Ruth that was not the right way to begin life. If Luke was ambitious he must find a better way. Nor could she help him, it seemed, in the least, for the young man had given her no right to do so.

"Oh, dear me," Ruth finally decided, "it is awfully hard being a girl—sometimes!"

No such questions and doubts troubled Agnes and Neale. Their course through life seemed a smooth road before them. They told each other their aspirations, and everything they planned to do in the future—that glorious future after school should end—had a part for each in it.

Neale O'Neil did not hope to do anything in life which would shut Agnes out; and the girl's thought marched side-by-side with his intentions. Everything hereafter was to be in partnership.

"For you know, Neale, no matter what Ruth says, I really couldn't get along without you."

"Crickey!" exclaimed the boy, "this old world certainly would be what Unc' Rufus calls 'de valley ob tribulation' if you weren't right here with me."

She smiled upon him gloriously, and used that emphatic ejaculation that always horrified Ruth:

"You bet!"

"You're a good pal, Aggie," said the boy, with feeling.

"And since that morning I first saw you and we both tumbled out of the peach tree," Agnes declared solemnly—"do you remember, Neale?"

"I should say I did!"

"Well, I thought you were awfully nice then. Now, I know you are."

So, perhaps Agnes and Neale were growing up, too.

CHAPTER XXIII

However, Tess usually waited for Dot after school so that the smallest Corner House girl should not have to walk home alone. It happened one afternoon during these first few weeks of school, while Tess was waiting with some of her classmates for the smaller girls, that Sammy Pinkney, Iky Goronofsky, and half a dozen other boys of Tess' age, came whooping around from the boys' entrance to the school, chasing a small, disreputable dog that ran zigzag along the street, acting very strangely.

"Oh, Tess!" cried Alfredia Blossom, the colored girl, "see those boys chasin' that poor dog. I declar'! ain't they jest the wust—"

"Oh, dear me, Alfredia!" urged Tess, gravely, "do remember what Miss Shipman tells you. 'Worst,' not 'wust.'"

"I'm gwine to save dat dog!" gasped Alfredia, too disturbed by the circumstances to mind Tess' instructions.

She darted out ahead of the boys. Sammy Pinkney yelled at the top of his voice:

"Let that dog alone, 'Fredia Blossom! You want to catch hydrophobia?"

"Wha' dat?" demanded Alfredia, stopping short and her eyes rolling.

"That dog's mad! If he bites you you'll go mad, too," declared Sammy, coming puffing to the spot where the little girls were assembled.

At this startling statement some of the girls screamed and ran back into the yard. There they met the smaller girls coming forth, and for a time there was a hullabaloo that nearly deafened everybody on the block.

Said Sammy with disgust:

"Hoh! if hollerin' did any good, those girls would kill all the mad dogs in the State."

As it was, the police officer at the corner used his club to kill the unfortunate little animal that had caused all the excitement. The S. P. C. A. wagon came and got the poor dead dog, and the doctors at the laboratory examined his brain and sent word to the newspapers that the animal had actually been afflicted with rabies.

It was a strange dog; nobody knew where it had come from. It had bitten several other dogs in his course as far as the school. Some of these dogs were sent to the pound to be watched; but some foolish owners would not hear of sacrificing their pets for the general good. So, within a fortnight there was a veritable epidemic of rabies among the dogs of Milton.

One man lost a valuable horse that was impregnated with the poison from being bitten by the stable dog that had been his best friend.

The order went forth that all dogs should be muzzled and none should be allowed on the street save on a leash. Sammy was very careful to keep Buster chained. Buster had not many friends in the neighborhood at best. So Sammy took no chances with his bulldog.

As for Tom Jonah, the old dog was such a universal pet, and was so kindly of disposition that nobody thought of including him in the general fear of the canine dwellers in Milton.

Tom Jonah was old, and had few teeth left. He was troubled now and then with rheumatism, too; and he seldom left the Corner House yard save to accompany the girls on some expedition. He went with them often in the automobile, especially when they went picnicking on Saturdays. He and Scalawag were very good friends, and sometimes he accompanied the little folks in their afternoon rides around the Parade Ground.

But as soon as the mad-dog scare started the girls were all very careful about letting Tom Jonah go off the premises. He was too old and dignified a dog to run out to bark at passing teams, or to follow strange dogs to make their acquaintance. Therefore the Kenways and Neale O'Neil thought it was not necessary for poor old Tom Jonah to wear an ugly and irritating muzzle all the time. The old fellow hated the thing so!

"I don't blame poor Tom Jonah for not liking to wear that old thing," Dot said thoughtfully. "It's worse than the bit in Scalawag's mouth. And see how Billy Bumps hates to be harnessed up. Supposin'," added the smallest Corner House girl, "we had to put on a harness and have our mouths tied up when we started for school. Oh! wouldn't it be dreadful?"

"I guess it would, Dot Kenway," Tess agreed vigorously. "I guess it isn't so much fun being a dog or a horse or even a goat."

"Huh!" growled Sammy who had become pretty well tired of school by this time; "anyway, they don't have to study," and he looked as though he would willingly change places with almost any of the pets about the old Corner House.

Neale always walked to school with the little folks now, for Ruth was fearful that there might be other dogs loose afflicted with the terrible disease. A panic among little children is so easily started. She could trust Neale to have a watchful care over Dot and Tess.

Nothing so bad as that happened; but there did come a day when tragedy because of the mad-dog scare stalked near to the Corner House.

The dog-catchers were going about town netting all the stray dogs they could find. Foolish people who would not obey the law deserved to lose their pets. And if they wished to, if the dogs were pronounced perfectly healthy at the pound, the owners could appear and claim their pets by paying two dollars.

This last fact, however, was something the little Corner House girls and Sammy Pinkney knew nothing about. They had a horror of "the dog catchers." The collecting agents of the S. P. C. A. are bugbears in most communities. When the children saw the green van, with its screened door in the back, and heard the yapping of the excited dogs within, Dot and Tess stuffed their fingers in their ears and ran.

The children did not understand that stray dogs were likely to be bitten as those other dogs had been by one afflicted with the rabies; and that it was much more humane to catch the unmuzzled animals, that nobody cared for, and dispose of them painlessly, than to have them become diseased and a menace to the neighborhood.

To make the children understand that it was dangerous to play with strange dogs was a difficult matter. The little Corner House girls were prone to be friendly with passing animals.

All hungry and sore-eyed kittens appealed to Tess and Dot; the wag of a dog's tail was sufficient to interest them in its owner; each horse at the curb held a particular interest, too. They were trusting of nature, these little girls, and they trusted everybody and everything.

In coming home from school one afternoon Neale was in a hurry to do an errand, and he left the little folk at the corner, hurrying around to Con Murphy's on the back street, where he lived. Ruth was away from home and Agnes had not yet arrived at the Corner House.

The Willow Street block, however, seemed perfectly safe. Tess and Dot strolled along the block, their feet rustling the carpet of leaves that had now fallen from the trees. Sammy Pinkney was playing solitaire leapfrog over all posts and hydrants.

Just as they reached the corner of the Corner House yard Tom Jonah heard and saw them. He rose up, barking the glad tidings that his little friends were returning from school, and as he felt pretty well this day, he leaped the fence into the street and came cavorting toward them, laughing just as broadly as a dog could laugh.

Even as Tess and Dot greeted him, Sammy Pinkney emitted a shriek of dismay. A big auto-van had turned the corner and rolled smoothly along the block. One man on the front seat who was driving the truck said to his mate:

"There's another of 'em, Bill. Net him."

The fellow he spoke to leaped out as the green van came to a halt. He carried a net like a fish seine over his arm. Before the little girls who were fondling Tom Jonah realized that danger threatened—before the frightened Sammy could do more than shout his useless warning—the man threw the net, and old Tom Jonah was entangled in its meshes.

The little girls screamed. Sammy roared a protest. The men paid no attention to the uproar.

"Got a big fish this time, Harry," said Bill, dragging the struggling, growling Tom Jonah to the back of the van. "Give us a hand."

For the big dog, his temper roused, would have done his captor some injury had he been able. The driver of the dog catchers' van drove the other dogs back from the door with a long pole, and then between them he and his mate heaved Tom Jonah into the vehicle.

Sammy Pinkney scurried around for some missile to throw at the dog catchers. The little girls' shrieks brought neighboring children to yards and doors and windows. But there chanced not to be an adult on the block to whom the dog catchers might have listened.

"Oh, Mister! Don't! Don't!" begged Tess, sobbing, and trying to hold by the coat the man who had netted Tom Jonah. "He's a good dog—a real good dog. Don't take him away."

"If you hurt Tom Jonah my sister Ruthie will do something awful to you!" declared Dot, too angry to cry.

"Wish my father was home," said Sammy, threateningly. "He'd fix you dog-catchers!"

"Aw-gowan!" exclaimed the man, pushing Tess so hard that she almost fell, and breaking her hold upon his coat.

But Tess forgot herself in her anxiety for Tom Jonah. She bravely followed him to the very step of the van.

"Give him back! Give him back!" she cried. "You must not hurt Tom Jonah. He never did you any harm. He never did anybody any harm. Give him back to us! Please!"

Her wail made no impression on the man.

"Drive on, Harry," he said. "These kids give me a pain."

The green van moved on. Tom Jonah's gray muzzle appeared at the screened door at the back. He howled mournfully as the van headed toward Main Street.

"Oh, what shall we do? What shall we do?" cried Tess, wringing her hands.

"Let's run tell Ruthie," gasped Dot.

"I wish Neale O'Neil was here," growled Sammy.

But Tess was the bravest of the three. She had no intention of losing sight of poor Tom Jonah, whose mournful cries seemed to show that he knew the fate in store for him.

"Where are you going, Tess?" shouted Sammy, as the Corner House girl kept on past the gate of her own dooryard, after the green van.

"They sha'n't have Tom Jonah!" declared the sobbing Tess. "I—I won't let them."

"And—and Iky Goronofsky says that they make frankfurters out of those poor dogs," moaned Dot, repeating a legend prevalent among the rougher school children at that time.

"Pshaw! he was stringin' you kids," said Sammy, with more wisdom, falling in with Dot behind the determined Tess. "What'll we do? Tess is going right after that old van."

"We mustn't leave her," Dot said. "Oh! I wish Ruthie had seen those horrid men take Tom Jonah."

As it was there seemed nothing to do but to follow the valiant Tess on her quest toward the dog pound. As for Tess herself she had no intention of losing sight of Tom Jonah. She made up her mind that no matter how far the van went the poor old dog who had been their friend for so long should not be deserted.

At the seashore, soon after Tom Jonah had first come to live with the Corner House girls, the dog had been instrumental in saving the lives of both Tess and Dot. He had often guarded them when they played and when they worked. They depended upon him at night to keep away prowlers from the Corner House henroost. No ill-disposed persons ever troubled the premises at the Corner of Willow and Main Streets after one glimpse of Tom Jonah.

"I don't care!" sobbed Tess, her plump cheeks streaked with tears, when her little sister and Sammy caught up with her a block away from home. "I don't care. They sha'n't put poor Tom Jonah in the gas chamber. I know what they do to poor doggies. They sha'n't treat him so!"

"But what'll you do, Tess!" demanded Sammy, amazed by the determination and courage of his little friend.

"I don't know just what I'll do when I get there but I'll do something—you see if I don't, Sammy Pinkney!" threatened this usually mild and retiring Tess Kenway.

CHAPTER XXIV

"In what way, Miss Maltby?" asked Mrs. MacCall.

"For us," said Aunt Sarah, nodding emphatically. "We're going to have the house cluttered up with boys and young men who will want to marry my nieces."

"Lawk!" gasped the housekeeper. "Will they be standin' in line, think you? Not but the bonny lassies deserve the best there is—"

"Which isn't saying much when it comes to a choice of men," Aunt Sarah sniffed.

"Well," returned Mrs. MacCall, slowly, "of course there'll be none worthy of the lassies. None who deserves our Ruthie. Yet—I'm thinkin'—that that young laddie that was here now—you know, Miss Maltby. Luke Shepard."

"A likeable boy," admitted Aunt Sarah, and that was high praise from the critical spinster.

"Aye," Mrs. MacCall hastened to say, "a very fine young man indeed. And I am moved to say Ruthie liked him."

"Eh!" exclaimed Aunt Sarah.

"You maybe didn't see it. It was plain to me. They two were very fond of each other. Yes, indeed!"

"My niece fond of a boy?" gasped the spinster, bridling.

"Why! were ye not just now speakin' of such a possibeelity?" demanded the housekeeper, and in her surprise, dropping for the moment into broad Scotch. "And they are baith of them old enough tae be thinkin' of matin'. Yes!"

Aunt Sarah still stared in amazement. "Can it be that that seems to have changed Ruth so?" she asked at last.

"You've noticed it?" cried the Scotchwoman.

"Yes. As you have suggested, she seems down-hearted. But why—"

"There's something that went wrong. 'Love's young dream,' as they say, is having a partial eclipse, so it is! I see no letters comin' from that college where the laddie has gone."

"But she hears from Cecile Shepard," said Aunt Sarah. "She reads me extracts from Cecile's letters. A very lively and pleasant girl is Cecile."

"So she is," admitted the housekeeper. "But I'm a sight more interested in the laddie. Why doesn't he write?"

"Why—er—would that be quite the thing, Mrs. MacCall?" asked Aunt Sarah, momentarily losing much of her grimness and seemingly somewhat fluttered by this discussion of Ruth's affair.

"'Twould be almost necessary, Miss Maltby, I can tell you, if he was a laddie of mine," declared the Scotchwoman vigorously. "I'd no have a sweetheart that was either tongue-tied or unable to write."

"Oh, but you take too much for granted," cried Aunt Sarah.

"My observation tells me the two of them are fair lost on each other. I watched 'em while young Shepard was here. It's true they are young; but they'll never be younger, and it's the young lovin' and matin' was made for—not for old bodies."

"You—you quite surprise me," said Aunt Sarah.

"You'd best get over your surprise, Miss Maltby," said the very practical housekeeper. "You should have your eyes opened. You should see them together again."

"Why not?" demanded Aunt Sarah, suddenly.

"Why not what?"

"Let the children have Cecile and her brother here for over Sunday—for a week end. Let them give a little party. I am sure I loved parties when I was a young girl and lived at this Corner House, when mother was alive."

"It's a good idea," said the housekeeper. "I'll make some layer cakes for the party. We'll not need to go to the expense of a caterer—"

She would have gone on immediately planning for the affair had she not, on glancing through the window, seen the dog catchers' green van rattling over the crossing of Main Street.

"There's those dog catchers!" she exclaimed. "I wonder if Tom Jonah's safe. There are some children running and crying after it—they've lost a pet I've no doubt."

Then suddenly she sprang to her feet.

"Miss Maltby!" she cried. "'Tis our Tess and Dot—and Sammy Pinkney, the little scamp! It must be either his bulldog or old Tom Jonah those pestilent men have caught."

Aunt Sarah had very good eyes indeed. She had already spied the party and she could see in the back of the van.

"It is Tom Jonah!" she exclaimed. "They must be stopped. How dared those men take our dog?"

Mrs. MacCall, who had no shoes on, could not hurry out. But Aunt Sarah was dressed for company as she always was in the afternoon. She amazed the sputtering housekeeper by stopping only to throw a fleecy hood over her hair before hurrying out of the front door of the Corner House.

Aunt Sarah Maltby seldom left the premises save for church on Sunday. She did not even ride much in the girls' motor-car. She had made up her mind that an automobile was an unnecessary luxury and a "new-fangled notion" anyway; therefore she seldom allowed herself to be coaxed into the car.

She never went calling, claiming vigorously that she was "no gadabout, she hoped." It was an astonishing sight, therefore, to see her marching along Willow Street in the wake of the crying, excited children, who themselves followed in the wake of the dog catchers' van.

The van traveled so fast that Tess and Dot and Sammy could scarcely keep it in sight; while the children were so far ahead of Aunt Sarah that the old woman could not attract their attention when she called.

It was a most embarrassing situation, to say the least. To add to its ridiculousness, Mrs. MacCall met Agnes as she came in swinging her books, and told her at the side door what had happened.

Agnes flung down her books and "hoo-hooed" with all her might for Neale O'Neil. As soon as he answered, sticking his head out of his little bedroom window under the eaves of Con Murphy's cottage, Agnes left the housekeeper and the excited Finnish girl to explain the difficulty to Neale, while she ran after Aunt Sarah.

Soon, therefore, there was a procession of excited Corner House folk trailing through the Milton Streets to the pound. Sammy and the two little girls trotting on behind the dog catchers' van; then Aunt Sarah Maltby, looking neither to right nor left but appearing very stern indeed; then Agnes running as hard as she could run; followed by Neale at a steady lope.

The boy soon overtook his girl chum.

"What under the canopy are we going to do?" he demanded.

"Save Tom Jonah!" declared Agnes, her cheeks blazing.

"The kids are going to do that," chuckled Neale in spite of his shortness of breath. "Guess we'd better save Aunt Sarah, hadn't we?"

"Goodness, Neale!" giggled Agnes, "they won't try to shut her up in the pound I should hope."