my house."

"Oh, Karl!" cried Mamma Wolf.

Elsa sniffed audibly. "What a tempest over a little thing! Uncle Hugo,
have some more beer?"

"I must be going," said Hugo, taking the beer nevertheless.

"So must I," exclaimed Roger, rising hastily. "Then it's settled,
Ernest?"

Ernest leaned over to take another sandwich. "It's settled. Don't cry,
Muetterchen. I'll bring you home a horned toad and you can make me a bed
and serve my meals in the garage."

Roger took Mamma Wolf's hand and kissed her cheek. "Good night, dear,"
he whispered.

Mamma Wolf smiled bravely and clung to his fingers for a moment. "You
have made me sad, Roger, but I can't help loving you!"

Roger kissed her again. "I'm not going to let you be sad long. I'll
bring Ernie back to you safe and sound. Well, I'm off to bed! Good
night, Elsa!" and he was gone with a bang of the front door.

The days to Christmas flew by with unbelievable speed. Papa Wolf washed
his hands of the whole adventure, as Elsa continued to call it, and
refused to allow any mention of it in his hearing. This was Ernest's
first insurrection, and his father seemed to have no tool but silence
with which to combat it. Christmas eve and Christmas day were celebrated
with all the usual beautiful German customs. It seemed to Roger that he
enjoyed them more each year, and this year, with the novel sense of
achievement in his heart, the joy of the day was unalloyed.

Although Papa Wolf was obdurate about the adventure, his big heart could
not permit him to allow him to let Austin spend Christmas day in a
hotel. When he learned that Austin had a wife and child in Washington,
nothing would do but that the Smithsonian man should share in a home
Christmas. Papa Wolf provided another guest also, a stranger named
Adolph Werner. He was a German banker, traveling across America on
business, and the Wolf family was instructed to treat him with great
deference. Stout and bespectacled, he proved a delightful guest and Dr.
Austin displayed a gift for comic songs that brought the house down.

The two guests discovered that they both had studied for several years
in Munich and a great meeting of spirits followed, materially assisted
by Papa Wolf, Uncle Hugo and a bowl of Glueh Wein. And when it was still
further discovered that Werner's next stopping place was St. Louis, he
was invited at once to join the Sun Planters, as Elsa had dubbed them.
He accepted at once and on New Year's Day, with Els