groaned Aunt Olivia.

The next day, and the next, Aunt Olivia watched behind her blinds. The
fourth day she put on her afternoon dress and followed the hurrying
little figure. Not at once--Aunt Olivia did not hurry. There was a sad
reluctance in every movement. It seemed a terrible thing to be following
Rebecca Mary--Rebecca Mary Plummer to a forbidden place.

Afar off Aunt Olivia heard faintly the shoutings that always heralded an
approach to the Tony Trumbullses, and shuddered. The tumult kept growing
clearer; she thought she detected a wild, excited little shout that
might be Rebecca Mary's. Her thin lips set into a stern, straight line.

A splash of red caught Aunt Olivia's eye as she drew nearer the joyous
whirl of little children. Rebecca Mary wore a little tight red dress.
The coil seemed closing in about the child.

Close to the southern boundary fence of Aunt Olivia's land stood an
old empty barn. It had been a place for storing surplus hay, once, when
there had been surplus hay. For many years now it had been empty. As
Aunt Olivia approached it she noticed that its great sliding door was
open. Strange, when for so long it had been shut!

"If that old barn door ain't open!" breathed Aunt Olivia, stopping in
her astonishment. "I ain't seen it open before in these ten years. Now,
what I want to know is, who opened it? Likely as not those screeching
little wild Injuns." She strode across the stubby grass-ground to the
barn and peered into its cool, dim depths. Then Aunt Olivia uttered
a little, bewildered cry. Gradually the dimness took on light and the
whole startling picture within unfolded itself to her astonished eyes.

Rebecca Mary was quilting. She was stooping earnestly over a gay expanse
of purples and reds and greens. Her little tight red back was towards
Aunt Olivia; it looked bent and strained. Rebecca Mary's eyes were very
close to the gay expanse.

Suddenly Rebecca Mary began to speak, and Aunt Olivia's widened eyes
discovered a great, white rooster pecking about under the quilt. His
big, snowy bulk stood out distinct in the shadow of it.

"I'm glad we're 'most through. Aren't you, Thomas Jefferson? It's been a
pretty LONG quilt. You get sort of tired when you quilt a LONG quilt. It
makes your back creak when you unbend it; and when you quilt in a barn,
of course you can't see without squinching, and it hurts your eyes to
squinch."

Silence again, except for the industrious peck-peck of the g