to thwart his only child.

Before she went to bed, Elliott, curled up on her window-seat, read
Aunt Jessica's letter. It was a good letter, a delightful letter, and
more than that. If she had been older, she might, just from reading
it, have seen why her father wanted her to go to Highboro. As it was,
something tugged at her heartstrings for a moment, but only for a
moment. Then she swung her foot over the edge of the window-seat and
disposed of the situation, as she had always disposed of situations,
to her liking. She had no notion that the Fates this time were against
her.

The next day her cousin Stannard Cameron came over. Stannard was a
long, lazy youth, with a notion that what he did or didn't do was a
matter of some importance to the universe. All the Camerons were
inclined to that supposition, all but the Robert Camerons; and we
don't know about them yet.

"So they're going to ship me up into the wilds of Vermont to Uncle
Bob's," he ended his tale of woe. "They'll be long on the soil, and
all that rot. Have a farm, haven't they?"

"I was invited up there, too," said Elliott.

"_You!_" An instant change became visible in the melancholy
countenance. "Going?"

"No, I think not."

"Oh, come on! Be a sport. We'd have fun together."

"I'll be a sport, but not that kind."

"Guess again, Elliott. You and I could paint the place red, whatever
kind of a shack it is they've got."

"Stannard," said the girl, "you're terribly young. If you think
I'd go anywhere with you and put up any kind of a game on our
cousins--_cousins_, Stan--"

"There are cousins and cousins."

She shook her head. "No wilds in mine. When do you start?"

"To-morrow, worse luck! What _are_ you going to do?"

She smiled tantalizingly. "I have made plans." True, she had made
plans. The fact that the second party to the transaction was not yet
aware of their existence did not alter the fact that she had made
them. Then she devoted herself to the despondent Stannard, and sent
him away cheered almost to the point of thinking, when he left the
house, that Vermont was not quite off the map.

Not so Elizabeth Royce. Bess knew precisely what was on the map, and
had Vermont been there, she would have noticed it. There was not much,
Miss Royce secretly flattered herself, that escaped her. She had heard
of Mr. Robert Cameron; but whether he resided in Kamchatka or
Timbuctoo she could not have told you. Mr. Robert Cameron, she had
adduced with