it?" inquired Edna in a tone of
surprise. "It wasn't on the nail when I looked there for it a little
while ago."

"You dropped it on the door-mat last evening," Reliance told her. "I
found it there and slipped it into the pocket of my apron, and this
morning when I went to get my apron, there it was so I just hung it up
where it belonged."

"Well, I'm sure," said Amanda, "that's easily explained."

"Who'd ha' thought it," said Ira. "Well, that let's us out of another
hunt. I won't have to wrastle with the door after all, will I?"

So, after all, Edna's early rising was unnecessary, but she did not feel
sorry that she had had such an experience, and was content to sit and
watch Amanda mould her biscuits and to help Reliance finish setting the
table. Amanda insisted upon giving her a drink of buttermilk from the
spring-house to which she despatched Reliance, advising Edna not to go
this time. "You've had one tramp," she said, "and moreover you'll be
starved by breakfast time if you don't have something to stay you."

The sausages were sizzling in the pan, and the griddle was ready for the
buckwheat cakes when Mrs. Conway appeared. "Well, you did steal a march
on us," she said to her little daughter. "How long have you been up? I
didn't hear a sound. You must have been a veritable mouse to be so
quiet."

"I've been up since before daylight," Edna told her. "I took my things
into the bathroom so as not to disturb you; it was lovely and warm in
there." Then again she repeated her story of the lost key.

"Reliance had the joke on her," said Amanda, "for she had the key all
the time."

"Why didn't you tell me you had found it?" asked Edna a little
reproachfully as she turned to Reliance, who had by this time returned
from the spring-house.

"I thought you would forget all about it, and I didn't think it was
worth while to mention. Besides," she added, "I ought to have carried
the key myself anyway."

"You're right there," remarked Amanda. "It is your especial charge and
you oughtn't to have let anyone else fetch it in. Moreover, you'd ought
to have hung it up the minute you found it, and there it would have been
when it was looked for."

"Oh, don't scold her," begged Edna. "It was all my fault, really."

Amanda smiled. "I don't see it just that way. Folks had ought to learn
when they're young that in this house there's a place for everything,
and everything should be in its place. I rather guess, though, that th