or so I may get to
the point where I'll be very clever, and very independent."

She smiled up at him, and he looked down at her with what she
characterized in her own mind as his motherly expression. "You're such
a little thing!" he said as if he couldn't help it. Then, after a
hasty last inquiry as to whether there was anything more he could do,
he went off in search of Francis.

She looked after him with a feeling of real affection.

"He's the nearest I have to a mother!" she said to herself whimsically,
as she addressed herself to the preparation of the evening meal. She
had conceived the brilliant plan of doing the men's lunches, where it
was possible, the night before. In this way, she thought, though it
might take a little more time in the afternoon, it would make things
easier in the mornings. Such an atmosphere of hurry as she had lived
in that morning, while it had been rather fun for once, would be too
tiring in the long run, she knew. And the run would be long--three
months.

The Indian came duly with the fish, all cleaned and ready to fry. She
was baking beans in the oven for to-morrow's luncheons. So she baked
the potatoes, too, and hunted up some canned spinach, and then--having
miscalculated her time--conceived the plan of winning the men's hearts
with a pudding. She was sure Pierre's cookery had never run to such
delicacies. And even then there was time to spare. The men were late,
or something had happened. So she looked to be sure that there was
nothing more she could do, and then strayed off to the edges of the
woods, looking for flowers. She found clumps of bloodroot, great
anemone-flowers that she picked by the handful. There were some little
blue flowers, also, whose name she did not know; and sprays of
wintergreen berries and long grasses. Greatly daring, she put one of
the low, flat vases she had found in her cabin in the center of the
men's trestle-table, and filled it with her treasure-trove. Then, a
little tired, she sat down by the table herself, resting for a moment
before the drove should come home.

They were in on her before she knew it. She thought afterward that she
must have fallen asleep. How dainty and how winning a picture of home
she made for the rough men, she never thought. But the men did, and
the foremost one, a big, rough Yankee, instinctively halted on tiptoe
as he saw her, leaning back in her chair with her eyes shut. Marjorie
was not in the least f