Meserve is too nervous," Rebecca went on, taking the
village houses in turn; "and Mrs. Robinson is too neat."

"People don't seem to like any but their own babies," observed Emma
Jane.

"Well, I can't understand it," Rebecca answered. "A baby's a baby, I
should think, whose ever it is! Miss Dearborn is coming back Monday;
I wonder if she'd like it? She has nothing to do out of school, and we
could borrow it all the time!"

"I don't think it would seem very genteel for a young lady like Miss
Dearborn, who 'boards round,' to take a baby from place to place,"
objected Emma Jane.

"Perhaps not," agreed Rebecca despondently, "but I think if we haven't
got any--any--PRIVATE babies in Riverboro we ought to have one for the
town, and all have a share in it. We've got a town hall and a town lamp
post and a town watering trough. Things are so uneven! One house like
mine at Sunnybrook, brimful of children, and the very next one empty!
The only way to fix them right would be to let all the babies that ever
are belong to all the grown-up people that ever are,--just divide
them up, you know, if they'd go round. Oh, I have a thought! Don't
you believe Aunt Sarah Cobb would keep him? She carries flowers to the
graveyard every little while, and once she took me with her. There's a
marble cross, and it says: SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF SARAH ELLEN, BELOVED
CHILD OF SARAH AND JEREMIAH COBB, AGED 17 MONTHS. Why, that's another
reason; Mrs. Dennett says this one is seventeen months. There's five of
us left at the farm without me, but if we were only nearer to Riverboro,
how quick mother would let in one more!"

"We might see what father thinks, and that would settle it," said Emma
Jane. "Father doesn't think very sudden, but he thinks awful strong. If
we don't bother him, and find a place ourselves for the baby, perhaps
he'll be willing. He's coming now; I hear the wheels."

Lizy Ann Dennett volunteered to stay and perform the last rites with
the undertaker, and Jack-o'-lantern, with his slender wardrobe tied in
a bandanna handkerchief, was lifted into the wagon by the reluctant Mr.
Perkins, and jubilantly held by Rebecca in her lap. Mr. Perkins drove
off as speedily as possible, being heartily sick of the whole affair,
and thinking wisely that the little girls had already seen and heard
more than enough of the seamy side of life that morning.

Discussion concerning Jack-o'-lantern's future was prudently deferred
for a quarter of an ho