angely lost.

"There are two of us," returned Dorothy, with conviction, wiping her
eyes.

"I wish you'd ask me things," said Harlan, a little later. "I'm no mind
reader. And, besides, the seventh son of a seventh son, born with a caul,
and having three trances regularly every day after meals, never could hope
to understand a woman unless she was willing to help him out a little,
occasionally."

Which, after all, was more or less true.

XVIII

Uncle Ebeneezer's Diary

Harlan had taken his work upstairs, that the ceaseless clatter of the
typewriter might not add to the confusion which normally prevailed in the
Jack-o'-Lantern. Thus it happened that Dorothy was able to begin her
long-cherished project of dusting, rearranging, and cataloguing the
books.

There is a fine spiritual essence which exhales from the covers of a book.
Shall one touch a copy of Shakespeare with other than reverent hands, or
take up his Boswell without a smile? Through the worn covers and broken
binding the master-spirit still speaks, no less than through the centuries
which lie between. The man who had the wishing carpet, upon which he sat
and wished and was thence immediately transported to the ends of the
earth, was not possessed of a finer magic than one who takes his Boswell
in his hands and then, for a golden quarter of an hour, lives in a bygone
London with Doctor Johnson.

When the book-lover enters his library, no matter what storm and tumult
may be in his heart, he has come to the inmost chamber of Peace. The
indescribable, musty odour which breathes from the printed page is
fragrant incense to him who loves his books. In unseemly caskets his
treasures may be hidden, yet, when the cover is reverently lifted, the
jewels shine with no fading light. The old, immortal beauty is still
there, for any one who seeks it in the right way.

Dorothy had two willing assistants in Dick and Elaine. One morning,
immediately after breakfast, the three went to the library and locked the
door. Outside, the twins rioted unheeded and the perennially joyous Willie
capered unceasingly. Mr. Perkins, gloomy and morose, wrote reams of poetry
in his own room, distressed beyond measure by the rumble of the
typewriter, but too much cast down to demand that it be stopped.

Mrs. Dodd and Mrs. Holmes, closely united through misfortune, were
well-nigh inseparable now, while Mrs. Smithers, still sepulchral, sang
continually in a loud, cracked voice, ne