it after that, not even when the mail brought word from "Aunt
Maria" that both of her dear boys would arrive in a day or two.

"Our last chance is gone, Annie," said Ford, when the news came.

"O mother!" she said despondingly, "what shall we do?"

"Have your sail, just the same, and invite your cousins."

"But the Kinzers"--

"Why, Annie! Mrs. Kinzer will not think of neglecting them. She's as
kind as kind can be."

"And we are to pay her with Joe and Fuz," said Ford. "Well, I wish Ham
Morris's storm would come along."

He only had to wait until the next day for it, and he felt quite
contented to be safe on shore while it lasted. There was no call for any
laughter at the prophecies of the fishermen after it began to blow.
Still the blow was not a long one, and Ham Morris remarked,--

"This is only an outside edge of it. It's a good deal worse than this
out at sea. I'm glad we're not out in it."

Ford Foster thought that about the worst of that weather was when the
afternoon train came in, and he had to show a pair of tired, moist, and
altogether unpleasant cousins to the room set apart for them. The clouds
in his mind did not clear away perceptibly even when, just after supper,
a note came in from Mrs. Kinzer, inviting the Hart boys to join the
yachting-party next morning.

"The storm may not be over," growled Ford a little sulkily.

"Oh!" said Annie, "Mrs. Kinzer adds that the weather will surely be fine
after such a blow, and the bay will be quite safe and smooth."

"Does she know the clerk of the weather?" asked Joe Hart.

"Got one of her own," said Ford.

Joe and Ford both found something to laugh at in that, but they said
nothing. They were both feeling a little "strange," as yet, and were
almost inclined to try and behave themselves; the main difficulty in the
way of it being a queer idea they had that their ordinary way of doing
things made up a fair article of "good behavior." Nobody had taken the
pains to bounce them out of the notion.

When the morning really came, sea and earth and sky seemed to be all the
better for the trial they had been through, and the weather was all that
Mrs. Kinzer had prophesied of it. The grass and trees were greener, and
the bay seemed bluer; while the few clouds visible were very white and
clean, as if all the storms had been recently washed out of them.

There was no question now to be raised concerning the yachting-party, or
any part of it. Not a single thing