every
old hen give an account of herself each night. By getting the
neighbours to subscribe to a magazine, Mrs. Cavers was able to add a
few dollars to her savings. The kind-hearted neighbours, who knew of
the projected visit, were all ready to help.

Martha Perkins gave Libby Anne ten fine young turkeys, half-grown, to
help to buy new clothes for herself, and the thought of the lovely
red curly cloth coat that she would be able to buy when she sold her
turkeys comforted her not a little when, tired out with her other
work, she came to gather them in for the night, and they obstinately
would scamper away into the trees; as unconcerned as if there was
never a wolf or a mink or a weasel in the world.

No crop was ever watched with greater hope and fear than that one.
Every bank of cloud that gathered in the west seemed to sit like a
dead weight on Libby Anne's heart, for it might bring hail, and
a hailed-out crop meant that they could not go home, and that
was--outer darkness. Perhaps it was the child's wordless prayers
that stayed the hail and the frost and the rust, for certain it is
that none came, and the crop was most abundant.

Libby Anne and Mrs. Cavers worked in the field to save a hired man's
wages. Libby Anne was a tireless little worker, and though many, many
times her thin arms must have ached, she never complained, because
every sheaf that she carried brought her nearer the Promised Land.

People driving past looked with pity at the tired-looking woman and
the little girl in the faded derry dress carrying sheaves almost as
big as herself, and one day Mrs. Burrell, the minister's wife, spoke
to them sympathizingly. Libby Anne flashed back at her almost
scornfully. "Don't you know we are going home?" she said, her tired
face kindling.

At last the grain was harvested and threshed, the neighbours kindly
assisting, and Bill began to sell his grain. He paid his store bills,
his binder-twine bill, his blacksmithing, and made the payment on his
binder. Libby Anne sold her turkeys and got her coat, and the day was
set for them to go east--December the first, the first excursion!

The day before they were to start, Bill went to town to cast his
vote; the Provincial elections were held that year on the last day of
November. There was a good deal of excitement over the election, for
Sandy Braden, the popular proprietor of the Grand Pacific Hotel, was
running against a Brandon man, and Millford was standing solid