dour by saying so."

"Oh, it's really very warm, and the lawn seems quite dry. I don't
blame Sally for wanting to show off the 'ancestral oaks.' It's almost
like June."

But--alas for plans which count upon the most June-like May weather--no
guests were served with afternoon tea that day except under a roof more
substantial than the low-hanging boughs of the great oaks. At
mid-afternoon, treacherously enough, the sky showed not a cloud, except
over beyond the timber lot, where they had risen to some height before
they could be discerned from the lawn. There Sally, lilac-clad, was
laying her fine linen cloth, setting out her thin teacups of the old
gold-banded china, and arranging Josephine's blue meadow-violets in a
curious, engraved glass bowl of Grandmother Rudd's. A small gust of wind,
lifting the edges of the heavy damask cloth and nearly capsizing the
violets, first called her attention to a change in the weather. Uncle
Timothy, bringing out chairs at her behest, paused and scanned the
horizon with an experienced eye.

"Looks a little dubious to me, Sally," he observed, although he came on
with his chairs. "Company due pretty soon?"

"It's four o'clock--they'll come very soon, for I sent word that we'd
have tea early on account of its growing cool after five. Yes--there is a
little bit of a dark cloud in the south beyond the woods, but you don't
think it will bring rain right away, do you?"

"If it begins to blow, it will--look out, there--" for another
brisk little zephyr lifted the corner of the tea-table cloth again,
and threatened the teacups. "Weather changes pretty suddenly
sometimes, in May."

"But the sun is so bright--and a minute ago I was thinking that it was
lucky the branches are so thick on this old oak, for the sunshine was
really uncomfortably hot. It can't rain right away. I'll bring out
everything, and be ready to offer them tea the minute they've said 'Good
afternoon.'"

Sally hurried away to the house, leaving Uncle Timothy standing
guard over the tea-table and keeping a weather eye on the gathering
patch of clouds.

But it could rain right away, as it presently proved. By the time Sally
crossed the lawn with her plates of bread and butter and tiny sugary
cakes, Mary Ann following with the tray holding the tea equipage, there
were strong indications of what was soon to happen. Sally had not more
than decided that it was best to retreat to the porch and await
developments, than the fir