rd him, and loosening herself
from Loretta, she ran round the horse and had Bub in her arms. Then she
looked up into the eyes of her step-mother. The old woman's face looked
kind--so kind that for the first time in her life June did what her
father could never get her to do: she called her "Mammy," and then she
gave that old woman the surprise of her life--she kissed her. Right away
she must see everything, and Bub, in ecstasy, wanted to pilot her around
to see the new calf and the new pigs and the new chickens, but dumbly
June looked to a miracle that had come to pass to the left of the
cabin--a flower-garden, the like of which she had seen only in her
dreams.

XVII

Twice her lips opened soundlessly and, dazed, she could only point
dumbly. The old step-mother laughed:

"Jack Hale done that. He pestered yo' pap to let him do it fer ye, an'
anything Jack Hale wants from yo' pap, he gits. I thought hit was plum'
foolishness, but he's got things to eat planted thar, too, an' I declar
hit's right purty."

That wonderful garden! June started for it on a run. There was a
broad grass-walk down through the middle of it and there were narrow
grass-walks running sidewise, just as they did in the gardens which Hale
told her he had seen in the outer world. The flowers were planted in
raised beds, and all the ones that she had learned to know and love at
the Gap were there, and many more besides. The hollyhocks, bachelor's
buttons and marigolds she had known all her life. The lilacs,
touch-me-nots, tulips and narcissus she had learned to know in gardens
at the Gap. Two rose-bushes were in bloom, and there were strange
grasses and plants and flowers that Jack would tell her about when
he came. One side was sentinelled by sun-flowers and another side
by transplanted laurel and rhododendron shrubs, and hidden in the
plant-and-flower-bordered squares were the vegetables that won her
step-mother's tolerance of Hale's plan. Through and through June walked,
her dark eyes flashing joyously here and there when they were not a
little dimmed with tears, with Loretta following her, unsympathetic in
appreciation, wondering that June should be making such a fuss about a
lot of flowers, but envious withal when she half guessed the reason, and
impatient Bub eager to show her other births and changes. And, over and
over all the while, June was whispering to herself:

"My garden--MY garden!"

When she came back to the porch, after a