h other several times during the last month
or two that there was still doubt. But she was not mistaken to-night in
thinking that Len's breath was strong from something alcoholic, that
Len's eager, loose-lipped speech, his unusual manner--She went over and
over the words she would use in telling her mother all about it in the
morning. The two women would carry heavy hearts on Len's account for
the whole cold, silent day. But they would not tell Pa--no, there was
nothing sufficiently serious as yet to tell Pa!

CHAPTER V

Martie and Sally loitered through the village, past the post-office and
the main shops and down through the poorer part of the town. They
entered a quiet region of shabby old houses, turned into a deserted
lane, and opened the picket gate before Dr. Ben's cottage. The little
house in winter stood in a network of bare vines; in summer it was
smothered in roses, and fuchsias, marguerites, hollyhocks, and
geraniums pressed against the fence. Marigolds, alyssum, pansies, and
border pinks flourished close to the ground, with sweet William, stock,
mignonette, and velvet-brown wallflowers. Dr. Ben had planted all these
himself, haphazard, and loved the resulting untidy jumble of bloom,
with the lilac blossoms rustling overhead, birds nesting in his willow
and pepper trees, and bees buzzing and blundering over his flowers.

The house was not quite definite enough in type to be quaint; it
presented three much-ornamented gables to the lane, its windows were
narrow, shuttered inside with dark brown wood. At the back-between the
house and the little river, and shut away from the garden by a
fence--were a little barn, decorated like the house in scalloped wood,
and various small sheds and out-houses and their occupants.

Here lived the red cow, the old white mare, the chickens and pigeons,
the rabbits and bees that had made the place fascinating to Monroe
children for many years. Martie said to herself to-day that she always
felt like a child when she came to Dr. Ben's, shut once more into
childhood's world of sunshine and flowers and happy companionship with
animals and the good earth.

To-day the old man, with his setter Sandy, was busy with his
bookshelves when the girls went in. Two of the narrow low bay windows
that looked directly out on the level of the kitchen path were in this
room; the third, the girls knew, was a bedroom. Upstairs were several
unused rooms full of old furniture and piles of m