f some cruel fate befalling her pet.

"I'll just bet Graham has him," declared Gyp, indignantly.

They tiptoed down the hall and up the stairs to Graham's door. Graham
lay in bed, sound asleep; beside him lay Pepper, carefully tucked under
the bedclothes. One of Graham's arms was flung out over the dog.

Some instinct told Jerry that a long-felt yearning in this boy's heart
had at last been satisfied. And Pepper must have felt it, too, for,
though at the sight of his little mistress a distressed quiver shot
through him, he bravely pretended to be soundly sleeping.

"Let him have him," whispered Jerry.

But, for a long time, Jerry, under the pink and white cover, blinked at
the little circle of brightness reflected from the electric light
outside, trying hard not to wish she had Pepperpot with her "to keep
away the lonesomes." The night sounds of the city hummed in eerie
cadences in her ears. She resolutely counted one-two-three to one
hundred and back again to one to keep the thoughts of mother and
Sunnyside out of her head; then, just as she felt a great choking sob
rise in her throat, she heard a little scratch-scratch at her door.

"Oh, _Pepper_--I'm so _glad_ you came!" She caught the shaggy little
form to her. She could not let him lie on the pink-and-whiteness, so she
carefully spread it over the footboard and folded her own coat for him
to sleep on.

How magically everything changed--when a shaggy terrier snuggled against
her feet. The haunting shadows fled, the sob gave way to a contented
little sigh and Jerry fell asleep with the memory of Gyp's dark, roguish
face in her thoughts and a consuming eagerness to have the morning come
quickly.

CHAPTER VII

HIGHACRES

Old Peter Westley had made up his mind, so gossip said, to build
Highacres when he heard that Thomas Knowles, a business rival, had
bought a palatial home on the most beautiful avenue of the city.
"Pouf"--that was Uncle Peter's favorite expression and he had a way of
blowing it through his scraggly mustache that made it most impressive.
"Pouf! _I'll_ show him!" The next morning he drove around to a real
estate office, bundled the startled real estate broker into his car and
carried him off to the outskirts of the city, where lay a beautiful
tract of land advertised as "Highacre Terrace," and held (with an eye to
the growth of the city) at a startling figure. In the real estate office
it had been divided into building lots with "rest