atskill farmhouse, there to hang upon each other's souls for the rest
of the summer.

Miss Lucinda's visits to her brother were reminiscent of a multiplicity
of children and a scarcity of room. To her the Inferno presented no more
disquieting prospect than the necessity of sharing her bedroom. She
always returned from these sojourns in the country with impaired
digestion, and shattered nerves. She looked forward to them with dread
and looked back on them with horror. Was it any wonder that when a
brilliant alternative presented itself she was eager to accept it?

Floss Speckert had gained her father's consent to spend her first week
out of school in New York provided she could find a suitable chaperon.
She had fallen upon the first and most harmless person in sight and
besieged her with entreaties.

Miss Lucinda would have flared to the project had not a forbidding
presence loomed between her and the alluring invitation. She knew only
too well that Miss Joe Hill would never countenance the proposition.

As she sat trying vainly to concentrate on her "Power Through Poise,"
she was startled by a noise at the window, followed immediately by a
dishevelled figure that scrambled laughingly over the sill.

"I came down the fire escape!" whispered the invader breathlessly, "Miss
Joe Hill caught us making fudge in the linen closet, and I gave her the
slip."

"But Florence!" Miss Lucinda began reproachfully, but Floss interrupted
her:

"Don't 'Florence' me, Miss Lucy! You're just pretending to be mad
anyhow. You are a perfect darling and Miss Joe Hill is an old bear!"

Miss Lucinda was aghast at this irreverence but her halting protests
had no effect on the torrent of Floss's eloquence.

"I am going to take you to New York," the girl declared "and I am going
to give you the time of your life! Dad's got to put us up in style--a
room and a bath apiece and maybe a sitting room. He likes me to splurge
around a bit, says he'd hate to have a daughter that acted like she
wasn't used to money."

Miss Lucinda glanced apprehensively at the door and then back at the
sparkling face before her.

"I can't go," she insisted miserably, trying to free her hand from
Floss's plump grasp. "My brother is expecting me and Miss Hill--"

"Oh, bother Miss Joe Hill! You don't have to tell her anything about it!
You can pretend you are going to your brother's and meet me some place
on the road instead."

Miss Lucinda looked horrified, but s