ged if I do!" he observed.

"Eh! . . . Well, I tell you; you sit down and let Babbie talk
Petunia to you a minute or two. I'll be right back."

He hurried into the back shop, closing the door after him. A
moment later Grover caught a glimpse of him crossing the back yard
and disappearing over the edge of the bluff.

"Where in the world has the fellow gone?" he soliloquized aloud,
amused although impatient. Barbara took it upon herself to answer.
Uncle Jed had left the caller in her charge and she felt her
responsibilities.

"He's gone down the shore path," she said. "I don't know where
else he's gone, but it's all right, anyway."

"Oh, is it? You seem quite sure of it, young lady."

"I am. Everything Uncle Jed does is right. Sometimes you don't
think so at first, but it turns out that way. Mamma says he is
petunia--no, I mean peculiar but--but very--re-li-a-ble," the last
word conquered after a visible struggle. "She says if you do what
he tells you to you will be 'most always glad. I think 'always'
without any 'most,'" she added.

Major Grover laughed. "That's a reputation for infallibility worth
having," he observed.

Barbara did not know what he meant but she had no intention of
betraying that fact.

"Yes," she agreed. A moment later she suggested: "Don't you think
you'd better sit down? He told you to, you know."

"Great Scott, so he did! I must obey orders, mustn't I? But he
told you to talk--something or other to me, I think. What was it?"

"He told me to talk Petunia to you. There she is--up there."

The major regarded Petunia, who was seated upon the heap of mill-
sides, in a most haphazard and dissipated attitude.

"She is my oldest daughter," continued Barbara. "She's very
advanced for her years."

"Dear me!"

"Yes. And . . . oh, here comes Mamma!"

Mrs. Armstrong entered the shop. The major rose. Barbara did the
honors.

"I was just going to come in, Mamma," she explained, "but Uncle Jed
asked me to stay and talk to Mr.--I mean Major--Grover till he came
back. He's gone out, but he won't be long. Mamma, this is Mr.
Major Grover, the one who kept Uncle Jed from being spied, over at
the flying place that day when I found the plan paper and he made a
shingle boat sail out of it."

Ruth came forward. She had been walking along the edge of the
bluff, looking out over the tumbled gray and white water, and the
late October wind had tossed her hair and brought the col