te.
Also, the ten acres have come pretty close to paying for the whole
twenty, as well as for this house, and all the outbuildings, and all the
pedigreed stock."

Saxon remembered what the young lineman had said about the Portuguese.

"The ten acres didn't do a bit of it," she cried. "It was your head that
did it all, and you know it."

"And that's the point, my dear. It shows the right kind of person can
succeed in the country. Remember, the soil is generous. But it must be
treated generously, and that is something the old style American farmer
can't get into his head. So it IS head that counts. Even when his
starving acres have convinced him of the need for fertilizing, he can't
see the difference between cheap fertilizer and good fertilizer."

"And that's something I want to know about," Saxon exclaimed. "And I'll
tell you all I know, but, first, you must be very tired. I noticed you
were limping. Let me take you in--never mind your bundles; I'll send
Chang for them."

To Saxon, with her innate love of beauty and charm in all personal
things, the interior of the bungalow was a revelation. Never before
had she been inside a middle class home, and what she saw not only far
exceeded anything she had imagined, but was vastly different from her
imaginings. Mrs. Mortimer noted her sparkling glances which took in
everything, and went out of her way to show Saxon around, doing it
under the guise of gleeful boastings, stating the costs of the different
materials, explaining how she had done things with her own hands, such
as staining the doors, weathering the bookcases, and putting together
the big Mission Morris chair. Billy stepped gingerly behind, and though
it never entered his mind to ape to the manner born, he succeeded in
escaping conspicuous awkwardness, even at the table where he and Saxon
had the unique experience of being waited on in a private house by a
servant.

"If you'd only come along next year," Mrs. Mortimer mourned; "then I
should have had the spare room I had planned--"

"That's all right," Billy spoke up; "thank you just the same. But we'll
catch the electric cars into San Jose an' get a room."

Mrs. Mortimer was still disturbed at her inability to put them up for
the night, and Saxon changed the conversation by pleading to be told
more.

"You remember, I told you I'd paid only two thousand down on the land,"
Mrs. Mortimer complied. "That left me three thousand to experiment with.
Of course,