e to dress for dinner. She
was not yet old enough to find household duties a bore, so the
afternoon had been delightfully spent.

Early after breakfast the next morning, however, Mary Louise started
out to explore the grounds of her domain. The day was full of sunshine
and the air laden with fragrance of flowers--a typical May morning.
Gran'pa Jim would, of course, read for an hour or two and smoke his
pipe; he drew a chair upon the broad veranda for this very purpose; but
the girl had the true pioneer spirit of discovery and wanted to know
exactly what her five acres contained.

The water was doubtless the prime attraction in such a neighborhood.
Mary Louise made straight for the river bank and found the shallow
stream--here scarce fifty feet in width--rippling along over its stony
bed, which was a full fifty feet wider than the volume of water then
required. When the spring freshets were on perhaps the stream reached
its banks, but in the summer months it was usually subdued as now. The
banks were four feet or more above the rabble of stones below, and
close to the bank, facing the river on her side, Mrs. Kenton had built
a pretty pavilion with ample seats and room for half a dozen wicker
chairs and a table, where one could sit and overlook the water. Mary
Louise fervently blessed the old lady for this idea and at once seated
herself in the pavilion while she examined at leisure the scene spread
out before her.

Trees hid all the neighboring residences but one. Just across the river
and not far from its bank stood a small, weather-beaten cottage that
was in sharp contrast with the rather imposing Kenton residence
opposite. It was not well kept, nor even picturesque. The grounds were
unattractive. A woodpile stood in the front yard; the steps leading to
the little porch had rotted away and had been replaced by a plank--
rather unsafe unless one climbed it carefully, Mary Louise thought.
There were time-worn shades to the windows, but no curtains. A pane of
glass had been broken in the dormer window and replaced by a folded
newspaper tacked over it. Beside the porch door stood a washtub on
edge; a few scraggly looking chickens wandered through the yard; if not
an abode of poverty it was surely a place where careless indifference
to either beauty or the comfort of orderly living prevailed.

So much Mary Louise had observed, wondering why Mrs. Kenton had not
bought the cottage and torn it down, since it was a blot on