stretch
our legs, and darned if there wasn't a Kutz drawn right up at the depot
platform, and he pointed out something I'd never noticed, and I was
glad to learn about it: seems that the gear lever in the Kutz is an inch
longer----"

Even this chronicle of voyages Harry interrupted, with remarks on the
advantages of the ball-gear-shift.

Kennicott gave up hope of adequate credit for being a traveled man, and
telephoned to a garage for a Ford taxicab, while Juanita kissed Carol
and made sure of being the first to tell the latest, which included
seven distinct and proven scandals about Mrs. Swiftwaite, and one
considerable doubt as to the chastity of Cy Bogart.

They saw the Ford sedan making its way over the water-lined ice, through
the snow-storm, like a tug-boat in a fog. The driver stopped at a
corner. The car skidded, it turned about with comic reluctance, crashed
into a tree, and stood tilted on a broken wheel.

The Kennicotts refused Harry Haydock's not too urgent offer to take them
home in his car "if I can manage to get it out of the garage--terrible
day--stayed home from the store--but if you say so, I'll take a shot at
it." Carol gurgled, "No, I think we'd better walk; probably make better
time, and I'm just crazy to see my baby." With their suit-cases they
waddled on. Their coats were soaked through.

Carol had forgotten her facile hopes. She looked about with impersonal
eyes. But Kennicott, through rain-blurred lashes, caught the glory that
was Back Home.

She noted bare tree-trunks, black branches, the spongy brown earth
between patches of decayed snow on the lawns. The vacant lots were
full of tall dead weeds. Stripped of summer leaves the houses were
hopeless--temporary shelters.

Kennicott chuckled, "By golly, look down there! Jack Elder must have
painted his garage. And look! Martin Mahoney has put up a new fence
around his chicken yard. Say, that's a good fence, eh? Chicken-tight
and dog-tight. That's certainly a dandy fence. Wonder how much it cost a
yard? Yes, sir, they been building right along, even in winter. Got more
enterprise than these Californians. Pretty good to be home, eh?"

She noted that all winter long the citizens had been throwing garbage
into their back yards, to be cleaned up in spring. The recent thaw had
disclosed heaps of ashes, dog-bones, torn bedding, clotted paint-cans,
all half covered by the icy pools which filled the hollows of the yards.
The refuse had stained the