, with the directness so
characteristic of her, "but I really think I ought to go back home. You've
been wonderful to give me such a long visit, and I've enjoyed the school
work immensely, but somehow I begin to feel like a soldier who has been
away on a furlough. It's time for me to get back to the firing line,
because mother needs me."

The Dean glanced up in surprise, and came slowly out of his dream of
concentration as the meaning of her words dawned upon him.

"Why, my dear child," he exclaimed, "this is very sudden. There has never
been any question about your going back, at least----" He coughed
deprecatingly. "Not since we became acquainted with you. Has anything
happened?"

"Why, nothing special--I mean, nothing tragic. It's only this, Dad's lost
a lot of money all at once. He did have a little income, enough so we
never have had to depend on the farm entirely, but now, even that has been
swept away. I suppose it will come back some time after the war, but as I
understand it, the stock he had has stopped paying dividends."

"Jerry never had any head for business." The Dean tapped one hand lightly
with his tortoise-shell rimmed spectacles in an absent-minded musing way
that nearly drove Kit frantic. "But what can you do about it, my dear?
Surely by returning at such a time you merely add to your father's
burdens."

"No, I won't," Kit answered, decidedly, "because I've got a plan that I've
been thinking about for ever and ever so long. I'm going to try and
persuade Dad to let us put in hogs."

"Hogs," repeated the Dean, in a baffled tone. "Hogs, my dear. Who ever
heard of raising hogs when they could raise anything else at all? I'm sure
that Horace never tried hogs on his farm."

Now it just happened that Kit had a smattering knowledge of Horace,
gleaned from Billie. In the old days back home, when they had studied
together, they had seemed to always get the personal side of the old
heroes and people of fame. And just now the only thing she could remember
about Horace popped up in her mind.

"Well, I'll bet a cookie there was many a time when he wished he had.
Don't you remember how he wrote,

"'Give me again my hollow tree,
A crust of bread and liberty.'

"We've had our hollow tree, and I'm afraid unless we get right down to
business now, we'll have all the crusts of bread and liberty we fancy. I
just can't stay here in this beautiful place with nothing to worry over,
while the family are