and still bore about her a whiff of frosty, night air.
Johnny was first upon the program, with a ready-made address beginning,
"Kind friends, we bid you welcome on this gladsome day," and the time
for its delivery was overdue.

Out beyond the curtain the Kind Friends were waxing impatient and the
juvenile contingent was showing violent symptoms of descending
prematurely upon the glittering little fir tree which stood in a corner
next the stage. Back near the door, feet were scuffling audibly upon
the bare floor and a suppressed whistle occasionally cut into the hum
of subdued voices. Miss Satterly was growing nervous at the delay, and
she repeated her question impatiently to Annie, who was staring at
nothing very intently, as she had a fashion of doing.

"Yes, ma'am," she answered absently. Then, as an afterthought, "He's
outside, talking to Happy Jack."

Annie was mistaken; Happy Jack was talking to Johnny. The schoolma'am
tried to look through a frosted window.

"I do wish they'd hurry in; it's getting late, and everybody's here and
waiting." She looked at her watch. The suppressed whistle back near
the door was gaining volume and insistence.

"Can't we turn her loose, Girlie?" Weary came up and laid a hand
caressingly upon her shoulder.

"Johnny isn't here, yet, and he's to give the address of welcome.
_Why_ must people whistle and make a fuss like that, Will?"

"They're just mad because they aren't in the show," said Weary. "Say,
can't we cut out the welcome and sail in anyway? I'm getting kinda
shaky, dreading it."

The schoolma'am shook her head. It would not do to leave out
Johnny--and besides, country entertainments demanded the usual Address
of Welcome. It is never pleasant to trifle with an unwritten law like
that. She looked again at her watch and waited; the audience, being
perfectly helpless, waited also.

Weary, listening to the whistling and the shuffling of feet, felt a
queer, qualmy feeling in the region of his diaphragm, and he yielded to
a hunger for consolation and company in his misery. He edged over to
where Chip and Cal were amusing themselves by peeping at the audience
from behind the tree.

"Say, how do yuh stack up, Cal?" he whispered, forlornly.

"Pretty lucky," Cal told him inattentively, and the cheerfulness of his
whole aspect grieved Weary sorely. But then, he explained to himself,
Cal always did have the nerve of a mule.

Weary sighed and wondered what in thu