now, and it would be dreadful if we couldn't go to either
party."

Peace walked to the balcony window and threw up the sash, murmuring, "If
only grandpa hadn't made us promise not to slide down the pillars! Oh,
I've got it, Allee! Look here!"

Allee scrambled up from the floor and hurried to her side, shivering in
the cold blast that blew in through the open window, bearing with it a
few feathery flakes, for it was trying hard to snow. "See that piece of
the wall that sticks out there, and--"

"But how can you walk on that little mite of a piece?" gasped Allee,
growing pale at the very thought. "And how would you get down to the
ground?"

"Oh, that's easy! The rain-pipe is fastened just high enough for me to
hang onto, and 'sides, the trellis goes part of the way to the porch
roof, and Jud hasn't taken down the ladder he put up there yesterday."

"Yes, but s'posing you should fall," wailed Allee in sudden terror, for
the water-pipe looked like a very frail support even for a child as
small and light of foot as was Peace, and the corner with the projecting
porch roof seemed so far away.

"There's snow on the ground. I wouldn't get hurt. But you needn't think
I'm going to fall. I've clum lots harder places than that before. You
stay here and when I get back you can tack up the wheat on the rail
post."

Carefully she stepped out on the balcony, slipped over the low railing
and set out on her perilous journey along the narrow coping, clinging
tightly to the rain-trough with one hand, and hanging onto the trellis
supports with the other till at last she was safe on the porch roof at
the corner. With an exultant shout she turned and waved her hand at
rigid, white-lipped Allee in the window, then slid lightly down the
ladder and out of sight. She was gone a long time, and the small watcher
above was becoming alarmed at her stay, fearing that the daring acrobat
had been caught at her pranks, and wondering what punishment would
befall her in such an event, when the bare, brown head appeared over the
low porch roof once more, and Peace inquired in a worried tone, "Do you
know whether birds eat hay? 'Cause I can't find any whole wheat out
there. It's all shocked."

"Why, I never watched them long enough to see," began Allee, eyeing the
great twisted wisp the older child had in her hand.

"Well, I brought some grain, too, but I don't know how we can tie that
to a pole, 'nless we leave it in the bag, and then how can the