n't disturb us!" the placard read that they impaled
upon the door, but the clatter of tongues inside belied the words.

"Isn't my idea fine about the lemonade and soup?" Patty demanded.

"The great thing about charity is not to make it charity. You must keep
people self-supporting," Priscilla quoted from their last lesson in
sociology.

"We'll fix little tables under the apple tree in summer and in the
parlor in winter," Patty planned, "and all the school girls and
automobiles will stop for lemonade. We'll charge the girls five cents a
glass and the automobiles ten."

"And I say, let's make Patrick and Tammas each contribute a dollar a
week toward their support," Conny proposed. "They must eat up a dollar's
worth of potatoes as they are living now."

They continued planning in whispers until long after "lights-out" had
rung; and Priscilla, in a laudable desire to be inconspicuous, was
obliged to crawl on hands and knees past Mademoiselle's open door,
before she gained her own room at the end of the corridor.

The moment recreation sounded the next afternoon, they obtained
permission to be out of bounds, and set off at a brisk trot. It was
their business-like intention to have all the statistics complete,
before submitting the matter to the assembled school.

"We'll first call on Patrick and Tammas and make 'em promise the
dollar," said Patty.

Patrick readily promised his dollar--Patrick was always strong in
promises--and the girls proceeded gaily to Tammas Junior's. They found
Granpa on the back doorstep anxiously wiping his feet; he was a
tremulous reed that bowed before every blast of the daughter-in-law's
tongue. Tammas Junior, after being taken aside and told the project,
thought he could manage two dollars a week. An expression of relief
momentarily took the hunted look from his eyes. He was clearly glad to
rescue his father from the despotic rule of his wife.

The girls turned away with their minds made up. It only remained to
secure the cottage, coerce the school, and hem the sheets.

"You go and price furniture and wall paper," Patty issued her orders,
"while I see about the rent. We'll meet at the soda-water fountain."

She found the real-estate man who owned the cottage established in an
office over the bank; and by what she considered rare business ability,
beat him down from nine dollars a month to seven. This stroke
accomplished, she intimated her readiness for the lease.

"A lease will not b