cilla send
for the Colonel with determination and it was I who got the salary
fixed with Father and urged the Colonel to respond to her summons.
They are as happy as "Love's young dream continued into maturity." I
quote the Colonel exactly, as I think it is a literary gem.

Being the best-man at the wedding is one of the honors that has come
to Father. I reminded him that the Colonel is not only a Stockell but
he is a Confederate hero. Father said that he appreciated all that and
that was what the salary was for.

"Bubble," said Tony, as he sat on the bench in our garden and fanned
himself with his hat, "now that you have got the old town geared up
and jogging along smoothly with your almost boylike energy, let's
forget all about 'em and get ready a really humming Scout-Campfire
ceremonial for the second night of commencement. I have got one
gruesome idea I will be ready to tell you about to-morrow. We needn't
let in Roxy or the Dumpling or the other Kittens until it is all
fixed, for they will be frozen with fear at the very idea of what will
be a Scout initiation, all right enough. But they'll do as you say
when the time comes, for the whole bubble bunch, including Belle,
since her algebra get-away, fall at any word you dope out to 'em from
now on. Well done for you! You are not only a brick, Phyllis, but a
whole wall of them that can be depended upon to line up to the mark."

I wrote that down not to be conceited, but I want to preserve that
opinion of me in you, Louise, because it means that I have, in a
little way, deserved the happiness that has come to me.

I came to this town a sad and lonely girl, with a great sorrow that
had kept me from being like other people and with a great distrust of
my father, who had had to be both Father and Mother to me. I have
found friends and interests and excitement and adventure and sympathy
and encouragement out here under that Old Harpeth Hill and I am always
going to keep them. I hope I never will go one step out of Byrdsville
as long as I live, though Roxanne has planned trips to every corner of
the world for us as soon as the Idol has finished this next invention.

The Byrds have to stay in the cottage until Father can build another
house for us to move into. Of course they will go back to Byrd Mansion
and reign in it as they have always done. But I smile to myself that
one person got ahead of that stiff-necked old portrait--I did, and
once she even seemed to smile dow