Chapter III: Part 3

"Matter with the ocean!" cried Alice, much disgusted with her thoughtlessness. "It's the tide. Don't you remember in Florida how it went up and down the beach each day, Mary Jane? We should have remembered and set our city further from the edge of the water."

As they talked, a second great wave broke in a frill of bubbles and down went the two nearest churches, three parks and a dozen houses.

"Regular earthquake-tidal wave effect," said one of Uncle Hal's friends who came up to the group just then. "Well, we were just going to take you into the water again anyway, so why worry?"

"Oh, goody!" cried Mary Jane happily, "we can build another city sometime, but we can't go in swimming with you and Uncle Hal--not very often we can't."

By the time the girls had had another good swim and had enjoyed the breakers till the boys were tired, Mrs. Merrill decided that it was time to come in. The sun was getting lower and lower, and already the breeze was blowing cooler.

"Dash up to the clubhouse quickly, girlies," said Mrs. Humphrey, "you know where I showed you to go. And then when you come back dressed we'll find something to eat."

But the girls took longer dressing than might have been expected--maybe they talked too much about the good time they were having--and when they reached the beach it was time the party was starting back for Boston, past time in fact, if Mrs. Humphrey was to keep an important dinner engagement. So there was no time for regular tea as Mrs. Humphrey had planned.

"But we can stop and get ice cream cones and crackerjack to eat on the way," she said. "Don't little girls like cones and crackerjack?"

"They certainly do," laughed Alice, "at least these little girls do."

"Then take this," said Mrs. Humphrey, handing her a five-dollar bill, "and get all you want, dear. This looks like a good place." They were back in the car of course, and Higgins had driven along the thoroughfare by the ocean--a street lined with shops.

Alice looked at the money with a feeling of dismay. How many should she get? One cone apiece and one box of crackerjack or maybe two? And how about the change? Five dollars seemed like a lot of money to carry into a crowd such as thronged the boardwalk by which the car had stopped.

Seeing her hesitation, Mrs. Humphrey said, "Would you rather I got it, dear?" and Alice replied so promptly, "oh, _will_ you, Mrs. Humphrey?" that the lady had no doubt, but Alice would enjoy herself more if she didn't have to make the purchase.

So Mrs. Humphrey got out of the car and hurried to the shop. It is hardly likely that she had made such a purchase before--certainly not often, for when she got into the shop she scarcely knew what to buy, or how much the girls could eat. Of course they would be hungry--she bought four boxes of crackerjack and five cones; that amount simply because that seemed to be all she could carry, and went back to the car.

"Can you help me?" she asked as she found herself too loaded down to step comfortably into her car. Mary Jane was on that side and she reached out and took the boxes of crackerjack while Mrs. Merrill took the cones.

"Where's Higgins's crackerjack?" asked Mary Jane making a hasty count.

"What did you say, dear?" asked Mrs. Humphrey who thought her ears must have deceived her, "Higgins' what?"

"Higgins's crackerjack," repeated Mary Jane, "you've got a cone for everybody and only four boxes of crackerjack. Doesn't Higgins like crackerjack?"

"I really--why--" Mrs. Humphrey was so amazed that for the minute she couldn't think of anything to say. _Higgins_ and crackerjack!

"Never mind," said Mary Jane, thinking to comfort her hostess, "there's plenty of ice cream and he can have half of my crackerjack--I'd be glad to divide it."

Before either Mrs. Merrill or Mrs. Humphrey could interfere, Mary Jane had slipped from her chair and was hospitably passing the cones to the dignified chauffeur. Never did a man look more insulted! He, Higgins, to eat an ice cream cone while on duty and in his best uniform! Perish the thought! But a glance at Mary Jane's kindly smile changed his answer and instead of frowning no without a word as he meant to, he smiled and said, "Thank you kindly, miss, but I must give all my attention to the wheel."

"Well, don't worry," said Mary Jane, "I'll eat it then." And she did.

*A DAY IN PLYMOUTH*

When Mary Jane stepped off the train in the little town of Plymouth the next morning, she expected to see the famous Plymouth Rock the very first thing. Instead, she saw a modern station with its line of autos, surreys and wagons drawn up along the side and a parkway stretching away toward the hill.

"Where do they keep the rock?" she asked her mother.

"Goodness only knows!" laughed Mrs. Merrill. "Don't expect me to know _everything_, honey. But I do know they have it around here somewhere."

"Oh, Mother," cried Alice, "look at that darling pony! Couldn't we get that man to drive us around some place? I'd adore to have that pony pull me!"

Mrs. Merrill and Mary Jane liked the idea too, so they engaged the driver of a quaint little pony cart to take them around the village.

But before five minutes had passed, they almost repented of their bargain. For, turning away from the station to the right, they began ascending a hill that taxed the strength of the pony to the utmost. Up they went and up and up, and the little pony pulled and pulled and pulled his best, but with such a load he couldn't go faster than a very, very slow walk.

At last they reached the top of the hill and there on an open plain they saw a handsome monument--the driver told them it was Forefathers' Monument.

"Whatever did they put it here for?" asked Mary Jane. "There's nothing here but a field."

"You should get out and look," said the driver proudly. "Just look--and you'll see."

They left the pony cart (they were glad to give the little fellow a chance to rest you may be sure) and walked close up to the monument before they turned around to look; and then they saw why the monument was set just there. Before them lay the bay, the blue waters sparkling in the bright sunshine; and to the left and to the right for miles and miles they could see the coast line gleaming gold with the shining sand, and back from the ocean to the north were the green marshes and fertile fields. It was a view long to be remembered.

"I expect the Pilgrims stood right here--didn't they, Mother?" asked Alice.

"Without a doubt they did," replied Mrs. Merrill, "and think how it must have looked to them! There were no fields then; only marshes and woods; no friendly city off in the distance; only strange Indians. I can imagine that many a time a lonely Pilgrim must have sat in this very spot and looked longingly out over the ocean toward the home they had left."

"They _were_ brave folks, weren't they, Mother?" said Mary Jane, much impressed with the beautiful view and the thought of the long-ago Pilgrims. "But where's Plymouth Rock?"

"We'll have to find that rock for you in a hurry," laughed Mrs. Merrill. "Well, at least we know it isn't on a hill, so we can go on from here if you are ready."

The pony cart next pulled them down the hill and that was nearly as exciting as going up, for it surely seemed as though the cart with its four folks would fall over on top of the little pony.

"I really believe," suggested Mrs. Merrill, "that we could get around faster if we'd walk, girlies," as they turned back into the station parkway. "Suppose we walk for a way and explore as we go?" The girls were willing, so the pony cart was dismissed, and the Merrills set out to explore.

They went south along the main street of the village, passed the museum where relics of the Pilgrims were kept and which they meant to visit later in the day; passed several big hotels and many stores till they came to the end of the village where the fishermen had headquarters. And there, at the shore end of a small wharf, they saw a stone monument. Not a big handsome one such as they had seen on the hill a few minutes before; a small stone monument with an open space in the center and an iron grating sort of a door shutting up the open space.

Alice and Mary Jane ran ahead to see what it was, and there Alice read the words, "Plymouth Rock." There under the monument, set in the arch made by the stone corners and protected from injury by the heavy iron grating, was the famous stone. It wasn't big as Mary Jane had expected it to be--it was just a common-looking boulder, and nobody would have thought of it twice if it hadn't been in a monument so folks would know it was something to look at.

"Well," said Mary Jane practically, after she had looked at it carefully for a minute or two, "I don't see how in the world they stepped clear from the ocean there at the end of the pier to here--I don't see!"

"But you must remember, dear," replied Mrs. Merrill, "there wasn't any pier then--just the ocean and the shore. No doubt the ocean was close to the rock then, for sometimes sand and rocks are washed around and the shore line changed in so many years as have passed since that day. Or, possibly, folks have moved the rock up here so it wouldn't get weatherbeaten by the winter's storms. I think that is most likely the reason why it is here."

As she was speaking, two men came up to the monument to make some repairs on the lock of one of the iron gates. As the gate swung open after they unlocked it, Mary Jane looked longingly in at the rock--if she could only touch it! What fun it would be to tell Betty and Frances that she, Mary Jane Merrill, had really touched Plymouth Rock!

One of the workmen seemed to guess what she wanted for he said to her, "Hello there, little girl! Did you come a long way to look at that rock?"

"All the way from Chicago," answered Mary Jane.

"Then I think you'd like to touch it, wouldn't you?" he said. Mary Jane nodded happily.

"Here goes then," he replied, and he stepped aside so she and Alice could stand inside the gate and actually lay their hands on the rock.

"I know something better than that," said the other workmen, much pleased with the girls' interest and joy. "We'll open the gate on the other side where the sun is shining and your mother can take your picture standing on the rock, just as the Pilgrims did."

Mary Jane was so excited by that fine idea that she could hardly stand still, but with the help of mother and the men the gates were at last open, and she and Alice took their places on the rock--and the picture was taken.

"Thank you so _very_ much," said Alice gratefully as the gates were again locked up, "that picture will be fine to take to school 'cause I'm studying American history."

"Then you want to notice that hill," said one workman, pointing to a hill close by. It wasn't such a very high hill but the sides were steep and grass covered and it was close to the shore. "That is the hill you will read about," continued the man. "After that hard winter when so many of the Pilgrims died, the bodies of the dead were buried there and the Pilgrims planted corn over the top, so the Indians would not guess it was a cemetery and find out how very many had died. You must walk up that hill," he advised Alice, "so you can tell your class about it when you get back."

"We certainly will," replied Alice gratefully, "and thank you for telling us about it."

They crossed the street and climbed the wooden stairway up the hill. On the top was an inn where a sign announced that luncheon was served, but the girls didn't care for anything so modern. Fortunately Mrs. Merrill had had the hotel put up a fine luncheon for them, so they wouldn't have to waste time eating indoors. As it was now nearly noon and the girls were very hungry, she suggested that they sit on some benches halfway up the hill and eat now, where they could enjoy seeing Plymouth, the ocean and the historic hill.

That seemed a splendid idea, and the girls agreed that never had fried chicken and sandwiches tasted as good as on Plymouth Hill.

"I do feel awfully selfish though," Mary Jane said as she polished off a drumstick, "to have such a good lunch at the very same place where folks died 'cause they didn't have enough to eat."

"I don't feel so selfish as I do thirsty," said Alice. "Now if I only had a drink--"

"No doubt we can find one," replied Mrs. Merrill. "If you've eaten all you wish, we can put the papers and scraps in that trash basket over there and walk on. Surely we'll find a drink soon."

They walked along the street, passing many an old curiosity shop where Alice would have loved to linger and price old candlesticks and bellows and chairs and all the curious wares she could see through the window; only she was so thirsty that a drink seemed more interesting than curiosities just then.

Turning to the left they went up a steep grade to another street and there, right in plain sight, was a beautiful drinking fountain. Without stopping to read the inscription she and Mary Jane had a good drink. Then Alice read aloud the tablet that said this water was piped up the hill from the very spring where the Pilgrim fathers first got their water.

"I think we're doing a lot of interesting things to-day," said Mary Jane happily. "We stood on Plymouth Rock and we ate lunch where the Pilgrims didn't have anything to eat, and now we're drinking out of their own spring! Now what do we do next?"

"I think we'd better walk up these steps to the old cemetery," said Mrs. Merrill.

Mary Jane thought it was awfully funny to walk up stairs on a street, but it was the only way to get up so steep a hill. Mrs. Merrill and Alice were much interested in the quaint, old inscriptions on the queer, flat tombstones, but Mary Jane was much more thrilled by the sight of the old funeral carriage which she saw in an old barn as they came down from the other entrance. It didn't seem possible that real folks had ever made such a funny, fancy carriage--it seemed more as though it was "made up" for a show!

The afternoon was flying along and they had to hurry if there was to be time to stop and see the wonders of the historic museum they had passed before. And, indeed, that was the hardest place of all to leave, for there the girls saw old spinning-wheels and looms, old-fashioned chairs, dishes and toys such as little folks used to play with--though goodness knows, children in those old days had very few toys of even home-made sorts!--and boats, models of real boats of those early days and oh, so many things, Mary Jane thought they would have to stay there a week to see all she wanted to see.

But they wouldn't stay a week, nor even an hour more, for at four they must take a train to Marshfield Hills where they were to visit Cousin Louise. If Mary Jane hadn't wanted to visit there very much she might have suggested to wait till another train; but she had so often heard her mother tell about this dear cousin and her little boy, that not even the curious boats and wonders of the museum could make her want to miss that train.

"Now you tell us all about 'em," she said to her mother, when, a little after four, they were seated in the train and speeding toward Marshfield Hills. "Is he big as me or is he a baby? And how do I talk to him?"

"Oh, you must play with him very nicely," said Mrs. Merrill, "for he's only a little bit of a boy--oh, lots younger than you are."

But when Mary Jane stepped off the train at Marshfield Hills she certainly was surprised, for the little fellow who sat in the front seat of the waiting auto didn't look as though he needed taking care of a bit!

*VISITING COUSIN LOUISE*

Cousin Louise was close to the train as it stopped, and she helped Mary Jane off and gave her a good welcoming hug as they hurried over to the auto.

"And this is John, my boy," she said proudly. "John, this is your cousin Mary Jane and this is Alice."

"You may sit up here with Dad and me," he said to Mary Jane, "and the others can sit in the back." Mary Jane saw in a minute that she was going to like John. He might be young but he wasn't a baby; it was plain that he expected to look after all the lady folks of the party just as he plainly was used to looking after his dainty little mother.

Mary Jane dutifully climbed into the front seat, with a little help from Cousin Louise, and then John played host by explaining to her all about their automobile. Mary Jane didn't know one thing about an automobile and she was much impressed by the fact that this little cousin whom she had expected to take care of and mother around, knew so very much more than she did. Bui she liked it; she liked his sturdy, frank way and she wished that they could stay longer and get acquainted, really acquainted, with so desirable a cousin.

Shortly, John's father who had been doing an errand, came back, and after greeting the travelers, started up the car and away they dashed, over the hills and bridges to the little white farmhouse by the mill where John lived.

Mary Jane loved the house from the minute she saw it. It had green blinds and a long front porch; a flower-covered front yard, an interesting looking barn at the side and a rambling kitchen at the back.

"Oh, Mother," she cried as the car turned in, "do let's stay a long time! Let's not go to-night."

"To-night!" exclaimed Cousin Louise, "surely you didn't think of going to-night?"

"That's what I had planned," said Mrs. Merrill. "You know there is a nine o'clock train to Boston, and I thought that would give us time for a nice visit-y dinner and we have so many plans for to-morrow."

"Then you'll just have to change your plans," said Cousin Louise briskly as she welcomed them into the comfortable old house. "We've lots of room and we'll loan you night things, and you can see what good times my sonny and your girls are going to have."

"Well, then--" said Mrs. Merrill.

"She's going to let you stay," said John. "Come on, let's go see my lamb."

He was a bit shy with his new grown-up cousin, Mrs. Merrill, but very comfortable and easy with the two girls.

"Coming along, Dad?" he called to his father as the three children slammed out of the kitchen door.

"Not for a while--got to see what's the matter with this," answered his father, who was tinkering with the automobile. "You take the girls through the barn and show them your pets. I'll join you in the pasture lot after a bit."

John needed no urging. He ran ahead to open the barn door and let his cousins in on the lower floor where his pet calf--a tiny little brown creature who looked wonderingly at her visitors--stood by her mother in a large roomy stall.

"This barn's most like grandpa's," exclaimed Mary Jane, as the sight and smell of barn things brought back to her mind the joys of the summer she spent visiting her grandparents in the country. "He had an underpart, too, where cows lived sometimes. And a stairs--have you a stairs that's most like a ladder?"

John had stairs just such as Mary Jane expected and, to tell the truth, he was a bit surprised to find that Mary Jane could run up the steep stairs as fast and as fearlessly as he could. He couldn't see how a girl who knew nothing about automobiles (when he was so used to them!) could know about anything at all.

On the main floor of the barn the children inspected all the nooks and corners, John explaining and playing host manfully.

"Now let's go to the pasture lot," he suggested. "I want to show you sumping there."

So out to the pasture lot they went, running gayly along the narrow roadway past the garden.

John led them up the hill, over stones and through briars and he wouldn't stop for anything till the very top by the fence was reached. Once there he looked around as though hunting for something.

"Why--where--?" he said in a puzzled way.

In the meantime Mary Jane stepped up close to the rocky wall bordering the pasture to pick some wild flowers she saw in bloom there. And as she reached into the bushes to pick the flowers, her hand brushed against something furred--and soft--and warm.

"Oh!" she cried drawing her hand back in a jiffy, "it's alive!"

John pushed into the bushes and there discovered what he was looking for--his best pet of all, his wee lamb. He caught firm hold of the soft wool at the back of the lamb's neck and pulling hard dragged the shy little creature out for inspection.

"Oh, I didn't know it was a lamb!" exclaimed Mary Jane happily. "I'm not afraid of a lamb, I'm not. I had a pet lamb too at grandpa's farm."

John and Mary Jane sat down on the nearest rock and fell to comparing notes about the lamb she had had and the lamb before them, and so busy were they that they failed to notice the approach of John's father with a wheelbarrow.

"Anybody want a ride?" he asked. "And Alice, if any big girl like you says she wants one, she's going to be fooled. But if any people the size of John and Mary Jane want one they'd better get in quick, because mother has just given the signal for dinner and that means come and wash your hands this minute."

John settled himself in the front of the barrow with his toes hanging over the wheel while his father lifted Mary Jane on just behind. And with Alice for an escort the party went back to the house.

"I love to wash hands at a back door," said Mary Jane enviously as she saw John's father splashing at a pan near the door. "It's so common to wash in a bathroom!"

"Well," laughed Cousin Louise, "I can't say that everybody agrees with you! I know I felt very grand when we had our nice bathroom installed upstairs. But if you'd really _rather_ wash down here, I think John can find you a pan and a towel." Alice went upstairs with her mother and washed in a nice, lady-like fashion, but John and Mary Jane had a beautiful splash-y time at the back doorstep and to judge from their red noses--and the towel--they must have come to the table every bit as clean.

"I could eat just everything," said Mary Jane ravenously, as they sat down to an appetizing-looking dinner.

"Well, you won't get everythin'," giggled John, "but Mother won't let you be hungry, will you, Mother?" he added hospitably.

And with all the good things before her, Mary Jane was sure she _wouldn't_ be hungry--lovely fresh peas, browned potatoes, salad in such a pretty bowl. For the next few minutes the children were too busy to talk, but by dessert time, John was again telling the girls some of the funny things his chickens and lamb could do.

"There now, John," said his mother interrupting, "I forgot the cream for the berries. Can you get it for me from the kitchen table? It's in the blue bowl."

John thought he could and he slipped down from his chair and hurried out to the kitchen. Coming back he didn't hurry for in his hands, held tightly, he carried a large blue bowl filled nearly full with rich looking cream.

"We always have our cream in a pitcher," remarked Mary Jane.

"You couldn't pour this cream out of a pitcher," explained Cousin Louise. "See?" She lifted a spoonful of the cream with a silver ladle and Mary Jane thought she had never seen anything so good looking. It was rich and creamy colored and almost as thick as soft gelatine. Alice was a bit worried lest it be sour, and she hated milk or cream that wasn't every bit sweet. But when the girls tasted it they found it sweet as could be and oh, so good.

"There are the queerest things around Boston," exclaimed Mary Jane as she smeared the thick cream over her berries ready to eat, "there are boats made like swans, and tides like in Florida, and a spring coming out of a pipe--that was in Plymouth--and cream that looks like pudding. Have you got plenty of it, Cousin Louise?" she added as she eyed the blue bowl.

Cousin Louise assured her that there was still plenty in the bowl and a great plenty more in the milk cellar outside so she could eat all she wanted. But to tell the truth, Mary Jane found that one big bowlful of strawberries and such cream was all she could eat, and she was soon ready for the drive that Cousin Louise proposed.

They drove through the marshes that much to the girls' interest proved to be the place where cranberries are grown.

"See?" said John's father as he slowed up the car so they could see the bushes and could, perhaps, imagine the red cranberries with which the low bushes would be loaded after frost. "Next time you eat your Thanksgiving dinner, you just look hard at the cranberry sauce and see if it didn't come from Marshfield."

Mary Jane giggled at his funmaking and promised to ask each cranberry she met during the coming fall.

Turning from the main road, they drove into the heart of a charming wood where Cousin Louise had them get out to see the wild flowers. There the girls saw, for the first time, the beautiful and very rare wild lady slipper which Alice thought was the loveliest wild flower she had ever seen. They didn't pick a single blossom as the flower is so rare that flower lovers will not take a single bloom from its home in the woods; but they looked at it so admiringly and so carefully that the girls were sure they never, never would forget its beauty.

Back into the car and around a couple of low hills they saw before them--the ocean--golden and blue and rosy as the varying lights of sunset were reflected in it.

"Oh," cried Mary Jane, "are we going swimming?"

"Not this late in the evening, I'm afraid, my dear," said Cousin Louise. "But perhaps mother will let you go in wading. We always carry towels in the back of the car for a good foot rub afterward." Mrs. Merrill approved, so the three children pulled off shoes and stockings and a minute later were dashing down toward the water leaving the grown-ups for a quiet visit near the car.

"Oh, look at the white stones!" exclaimed Mary Jane, as they wandered around on the beach after the first hilarious fun of wading. "I'm going to put some in my pocket. There's one. There's another. See, John, aren't they pretty?"

John agreed and was so diligent in helping to pick them up and so generous in handing over all he could find to Mary Jane, that by the time the children were called to come and dry their feet, Mary Jane's pockets were loaded down and Alice's were full of the overflow.

"I think they'll charge excess baggage for you, young lady," laughed John's father as he lifted Mary Jane into her place by John. "You're not going to take all those stones back to Chicago, are you?"

"Well," began Mary Jane, and then she saw how impossible it would be to carry so many so she decided, "I'm going to take two, the roundest, whitest two, and I'm going to leave the others for John. You'll like 'em, won't you, John?"

John hadn't an idea what he would do with stones but he was always glad to acquire valuable possessions, so he answered, "You bet!" most vigorously, and Mary Jane was happy.

Back at the house, John rushed upstairs ahead of the girls and they couldn't imagine the reason for his hurry--children don't usually like to go to bed in a rush like that, at least the Merrill girls didn't.

But when, a few minutes later, they leisurely went up, they found the reason for his hurry. He met them at the top of the stairs and offered to each girl a pair of his own pajamas! He remembered that his mother had promised night things and he wanted to be a good host. The girls looked with dismay at the cunning little blue pajamas offered them, but their mother came to their rescue.

"Thank you so much, John," she said to the little boy, "you certainly were nice to plan for the girls. Now, don't you want to show us your room? You know you promised you would." And John, carelessly handing over the pajamas, hurried off to display the room of which he was so proud.

A few minutes later the tired little fellow was sound asleep, and then Cousin Louise brought her guests a supply of night things that made them very comfortable.

"I wish I didn't have to go to bed," sighed Mary Jane as she trailed the length of her cousin's pretty gown over the floor. "I think it's horrid when you have a big lady's nighty and it's so long and pretty and like a court dress that then you just have to go to bed and sleep!"

"Well, if you don't go to bed pretty soon," laughed Cousin Louise, "you'll hear my alarm clock and John's roosters before you get to sleep."

But there was no real danger of that because Mary Jane was so tired that the minute her head touched the pillow she was sound asleep and dreaming of white stones that perched up on top of Plymouth Rock and of a dear woolly lamb that came over in the Mayflower.

*THE WILLOW TREE COTTAGE*

Mary Jane thought she never could wake up the next morning. She heard her mother and Cousin Louise talking in the next room, she heard John calling, "Mary Jane! Mary Jane! When you coming to breakfast?" But she simply couldn't make herself wake up and answer. She dozed off again and again, she was so very sleepy.

Finally she heard Cousin Louise say, "Your mother says you must get up, dear, so if you'll jump into the bath that is all ready for you, I'll have breakfast waiting when you come back." Mary Jane heard John and Alice laughing and playing under her window, so she hopped out of bed in a hurry and ran in to take her bath.

When she came back, she found that Cousin Louise had pulled a little table up to the window overlooking the garden and barnyard, and that on the table was spread out the nicest breakfast any girl could ask for.

"There now," said Cousin Louise as she laid a bathrobe around her little guest, "while you eat we're going to visit, because when there are so many other folks around, we don't get a chance to say a word." Mary Jane liked that breakfast ever so much. She told Cousin Louise all about Class Day and the game and the lobster salad and commencement and dancing with one of Uncle Hal's grown-up friends and the shoes that slipped up and down and made a blister--and everything. And as she talked she ate and ate--till all the fresh strawberries and all the egg and potatoes and coffee cake and milk and cereal that Cousin Louise had carried upstairs on the tray had vanished.

"Well," laughed Cousin Louise, "see how stupid I sit here without getting you one single bit of breakfast!" And she laughed at the tray of empty dishes.

"Never mind about any breakfast," replied Mary Jane continuing the joke, "I don't somehow seem hungry for anything this morning Anything _more_ you might say!"

"Then you slip into your clothes as fast as ever you can," said Cousin Louise, "and run out to the barn. John's been watching his favorite hens since he first got up in hopes there would be eggs for you to gather before train time."

It didn't take Mary Jane long to dress and as Mrs. Merrill came in just at the right time to brush her hair and put on her hair bow, she was soon out in the barn lot with Alice and John.

With diligent hunting the three children discovered four eggs by the time that John's father called to them that it was time to go to the train.

"You take 'em with you in your pocket," said John hospitably giving his little cousin all four eggs. "You take 'em 'cause they're good and I'll let you have 'em."

Mary Jane took them gratefully. She had never been particularly fond of eggs but John's eggs, like grandpa's eggs, tasted awfully good and she was quite willing to carry four home. She promised faithfully to carry them all the way to Chicago so her father could taste one. "That'll make one for each of us, 'cause there's four of us," she told John as she put the fourth one in her second pocket.

But when the children got back to the house Mrs. Merrill inquired into the cause of the bulging pockets and out came the eggs--to stay in Marshfield.

"Why Mary Jane," said her mother, "you've stones, all those white stones you gathered on the beach last night, you know, and stones and eggs don't mix very well, you'd find. Then we're going 'way up to Rye Beach for Sunday, and you'll have lots to carry as it is. And there's no use taking the eggs away from John just to run the risk of breaking them, is there?"

Mary Jane agreed that there was no use of that. And with John's promise that next time she came she could have four eggs--not necessarily these same eggs however--for her very own, she was satisfied to put the eggs in the ice-box and wash her hands ready to go to the train.

The little cousins hated to leave each other; they were just getting well acquainted and were planning all sorts of fun they could do together. But Mrs. Merrill thought that Mary Jane, and Alice too, had had such a very busy week that they had better have a very quiet week-end. So as Uncle Hal had friends outside of Boston he wanted to see before leaving for his home in the middle west, it was decided that Mrs. Merrill and the girls go up to a quiet little hotel at Rye Beach and spend Sunday resting and loafing, and that they meet in Boston again on Monday to finish up the sightseeing and visiting.

"You come and see me again," shouted John, as the girls climbed aboard their train half an hour later. "Don't you forget to come to see me and get your eggs!"

"I won't forget," called back Mary Jane, and then, much to the surprise of the brakeman who was giving the signal to go ahead, she stepped half down the steps of her car and shouted back to John, "Next time I come I'm going to stay all day and get a lot of eggs--all the eggs you've got!" Then she hurried into the car to wave to John out of the window as the train moved away.

It was a very dusty morning, as there hadn't been rain for more than two weeks; so Mrs. Merrill shut the window by which they sat. Mary Jane liked that, for then she had a window sill where she could spread out her precious stones without danger of losing any out of the window.

"Now that's the father stone," she whispered to herself, as she hunted out the biggest stone and put it in the left hand corner of the sill, "and that's the mother stone," she added as she chose the next biggest, a round white stone that was her favorite, "and this is the big sister stone and this the big brother stone and here's all the little stones." She pulled them out of her pocket, every one and made a long row of stone children that filled the whole window sill.

"I guess I'll call them Mr. and Mrs. Stone," she laughed softly to herself, and then I'll name the Stone children. "You're Patricia," she announced to the biggest stone sister, "and you're William Stone and you're Edward and you're Margaret and you're Ellen and you're--you're--dear me! How in the world do people name their families? I should think it would be hard work! I should think it would be as hard as naming rivers."

The thought of rivers made Mary Jane remember that she was thirsty, so, with her mother's permission, she went up to the front end of the car where the case of paper drinking cups and the water fountain was. The drinking cup case didn't work very well, and Alice had to come and give her assistance before two cups were dropped out of the slot so that the little girls could get a cool drink. Then Boston was so near that Mary Jane had time only to pick up her Stone family and stow them safely in her pocket--and it was time to get off. There hadn't been a minute to wonder what she would do--the time just went that quickly.

They took a taxi up to their hotel, packed bags with things they would need for over Sunday, ate a bit of lunch and hurried back to the station to catch the train for Rye Beach.

"Did you ever see so many pretty flowers!" exclaimed Alice as their train went past station after station made beautiful with flowers--late irises, early roses, bridal wreath and snowballs, to say nothing of the gay geraniums in formal beds along by the tracks. "Wouldn't you love to have somebody say, 'just pick all you want to, Alice Merrill?'"

"We wouldn't have time to pick 'em, 'cause the train doesn't stop; it's taking us to Rye Beach where Mother went a long time ago. Tell us about it, Mother dear," Mary Jane added. So Mrs. Merrill snuggled the tired little girl close up and told her about the time she and her brothers went to Rye Beach so long ago and how they all went in bathing in the surf when the whistle blew the temperature of the water; and what good things they had to eat at the Willow Tree Cottage and how--but there wasn't any use talking any more, for Mary Jane was fast asleep.

Mrs. Merrill glanced over at Alice who was reading a favorite book Cousin Louise had given her, then she too picked up a magazine and read as the train sped northward toward New Hampshire.

It was a good thing Mary Jane had a long nap that afternoon, for when they got off at their station they found they were still a long way from Willow Tree Cottage and that there was a lot to see on the way. Several passengers got off, and the bus which met the train was filled to the last seat.

First they drove along by some pretty golf links where many folks were enjoying an afternoon game; then they turned into a handsome big hotel. Mary Jane saw children running up and down the broad verandas and caught a glimpse of the ocean through the trees.

"I'd like that place to live," she said to herself, "I wonder if that's where we're going?" But it wasn't.

Next they drove down a street where there were many private houses, in front of some of which the bus stopped to drop passengers. Mary Jane saw children playing in the grassy yards and everything looking so homelike and restful that she couldn't help but think, "I wonder if that's where we're going. I'd like to have that our place." But it wasn't.

Then they drove around a corner with a flourish that almost sent Mary Jane from her seat and out through the opposite window, and drove up in front of a grand-looking hotel right close to the ocean. Folks in pretty light dresses were walking on the broad porches. Children were playing in the great sand-pile out under the trees, and young folks were having a croquet match over near the beach.

"Now that must be where we're going," thought Mary Jane. But it wasn't.

At last, when everyone but Mary Jane and her mother and sister were out of the bus, the driver whipped up his horses and drove away down the beach and then turned down a short road and stopped in front of a rambling, old New England farmhouse. It was painted white, with green shutters; the porch had comfortable chairs enough for a big, big family and rambled around the front and sides of the house as though it was in search of the kitchen door. But out in front, close by where the bus stopped, was the most interesting sight of all--a great willow tree. It had half a dozen trunks all grown partly together and each big enough to make a tree of itself; it had wide spreading branches that arched over the roadway, over the house and over a wide, grassy yard. And under the tree, just past the porch steps was a swing, a big sand pile and a small merry-go-round and a slide place so that little folks who slid down it would tumble gently into the clean white sand.

Was Mary Jane glad that they hadn't stopped at the other places? You should have seen her happy face!

"Oh, Mother," she cried, "let's not just stay here over Sunday! Let's send for Daddah and stay and stay and stay 'cause I know I'm going to have a good time here."

But before Mrs. Merrill had time to answer, Mrs. Bryan, the hospitable lady who owned the cottage, came out to greet them and to say to Mary Jane, "Oh, my dear! I'm so glad you're here! Because I have the nicest surprise for you! Come right into the house and see. I know you'll like it because it's just what your mother and your Uncle Hal always liked to see."

And Mary Jane, followed by Alice, both wondering what in the world the surprise might be, hurried out of the bus and into the house.

*LOST! ONE MARY JANE*

"Can we see it right away?" asked Mary Jane as she hesitated by the newel post at the front stairs. (It was a lovely long, straight stairway with a white banister made of dainty white spindles and a mahogany railing wide and shining on top--just exactly the right sort of a banister for sliding down, and Mary Jane resolved to take a trial slide the first time she could get the hallway to herself!)

"If it's what I think it is," said Mrs. Merrill, looking laughingly at Mrs. Bryan, "you'd better run upstairs and wash off the stains of your journey before you go to see it, because once you get out in the kitchen with Mrs. Bryan you won't want to bother with washing and combing. Is it what I think?" she added.

"Pretty likely!" laughed Mrs. Bryan, "you're not forgetting so easily what you always liked to see. So do as your mother says, Mary Jane," she added kindly to the little girl, "and as soon as she says you may, come out through that door over there and you'll find me."

Alice dashed up the stairs, with Mary Jane close at her heels, and in a very short time they were down again with clean hands and faces and fresh frocks and hair ribbons. Out through the door they went, through the dining-room and into a great, roomy kitchen about as different from their own little apartment kitchen as one could imagine. It had a big pastry table in the middle; two huge stoves at one side and a long sink and several tables on another side. Big windows looked out on a grassy yard.

"Oh!" exclaimed Mary Jane rapturously, "I'd just love to live at your house, Mrs. Bryan. Would you let me beat eggs and fix the edges of pies and wipe dishes?"

"And the cupboards!" exclaimed Alice no less pleased, "would you look at these cupboards, Mary Jane! Wouldn't you just adore getting out sugar and spice and putting dishes away?"

"Well," replied Mrs. Bryan, half puzzled but very much pleased with their enthusiasm, "you're not much like most of the children who come here. Mostly they don't know or care what a kitchen looks like or where it is! I can't think what their mothers mean either, because a house without a kitchen is just nothing. And as for offering to help with dishes--" The good lady broke off in amazement at the unusual occurrence of two boarders offering assistance because they _wanted_ to.

"Was this the surprise and may I look in that cupboard?" asked Alice as she spied a stack of pretty blue and white dishes--just the kind she had always wanted for her own--behind a half open cupboard door.

"Mercy no!" laughed Mrs. Bryan, "this isn't the surprise. But goodness knows you may look in any cupboard you like, dearie; I know you won't do any harm because you like things too well. The surprise is out here."

The girls followed her through a long pantry, the walls of which were covered with cupboards and shelves clear up to the high ceiling, through a summer kitchen where maids were working at preparations for supper, and out into a half dim shed, the floor of which felt soft under their feet because it was covered with thousands of tiny chips of wood, left from the chopping of wood for the big kitchen range.

"There," she said, pointing to two great tubs near the outside door, "that's what your mother and your uncles used to like to see when they used to come here. Have 'em every Saturday evening--just that many," she added as she pointed to the baskets, "and it's time they went into the pot this very minute."

"But what _are_ they?" asked Alice while Mary Jane just stared at the queer sight.

Two heavily woven split baskets, bigger than bushel baskets, considerably, were filled with brownish, greenish things that seemed to move--but of course they _couldn't_--but they _did_, they surely _did_. Moved slowly but crawlingly like great spiders--

"Ugh!" shivered Mary Jane, "whatever are they?"

"You've a good catch this time, haven't you?" Mrs. Merrill's voice behind her reassured Mary Jane. Her mother had followed them out and surely if her mother didn't mind those queer things, they must be all right for she well knew her mother didn't like spiders any better than she did!

"But what _are_ they?" insisted Alice wonderingly.

"Don't you know," laughed Mrs. Bryan, "they're lobsters. Sam caught 'em just to-day and a fine lot they are too. Do you like lobsters?"

"Um-m," replied Alice, "do I? You just try me! But all the lobsters I ever ate were red, bright red."

"Sure enough," laughed Mrs. Bryan as she bustled about a great iron pot in a corner, "and all you ever will eat will be, I hope, because they'll be cooked. The cooking makes 'em red. These are alive."

"But if they're alive you can't cook 'em!" exclaimed Mary Jane in great excitement.

"Oh, yes we can," replied Mrs. Bryan comfortably, "just that easily. We have the water boiling hot and dump 'em in--just that quick and they never know what happens to 'em. Now you can go out this door," she added, "because we've got to hurry now with supper. But don't you go far, for pretty soon you'll hear a gong and that means 'come to supper!' and you come first thing because I know you must be hungry."

Mary Jane and Alice needed no urging--they were hungry, for it had been a long time since breakfast at Cousin Louise's, and their hurried luncheon in Boston wasn't much to remember.

They ran out to the sand-pile, looked at the pretty shells, took a slide or two and a few swings in the big swing and made friends with the two children, a boy and a girl from Springfield, Massachusetts, who were playing there, and, in a very short while it seemed, the gong sounded and they went in to supper.

It was a different sort of a supper from any Mary Jane had ever eaten away at a hotel--though as a matter of fact the Willow Tree Cottage wasn't really a hotel at all; it was an old New England farmhouse enlarged a bit and opened to some twenty-five selected boarders through the summer season. And this meal truly was not a dinner such as Mary Jane was used to eating in the evening; it was a real supper, delicious and old fashioned as one could hope to find. There was coffee cake, fresh baked and luscious with great "wells" of sugar and butter running through in streaks of sweetness; baked beans in brown pots; cold ham, coldslaw with a sour cream sauce, and hot potatoes with cream gravy. And then, after each table full of guests were seated and the meal began, Mrs. Bryan herself (she would trust this task to no one else) appeared with a great platter of lobsters, red and shining and smelling oh, so good!

Mary Jane helped herself very daintily but Mrs. Bryan said, "Here, honey, that's no way to eat at my house! You take a big helping and then pass up! There's three more platterfuls like this out on the kitchen table!" The girls needed no second urging; they liked lobster, but as they polished off claw after claw, they agreed that never _never_ had they eaten lobster before--not really truly lobster as this luscious food proved to be.

As the maid appeared to ask what dessert they wanted, Mrs. Merrill said, "Do you want any dessert, girls? You've had such a good supper already."

"Why mother!" exclaimed Mary Jane, "we _were hungry_!" And then as the maid said, "Huckleberry shortcake and apple pie" (meaning of course that Mary Jane should take her choice), Mary Jane, not understanding, replied blissfully, "I like 'em both, thank you!"

"Bless her heart!" laughed Mrs. Bryan, "she shall have 'em both, Ann. You bring the girls each a helping of pie and shortcake--it's not too rich, it won't hurt 'em for once," she added as she saw Mrs. Merrill starting to object, "remember how you used to eat two helpings of dessert and how _you_ made your dear father so ashamed!" Mrs. Merrill and the good lady laughed in recollection--and the girls had their double dessert.

In the long twilight the Merrills took a leisurely walk through the pine tree grove off toward the south of the cottage and home along the rocks by the ocean. By the time they turned toward home the sun had set in rosy glory and through the gathering shadows could be seen the gleam of lights in lighthouses near and far. 'Way down the coast on some jutting rocks, still farther down on an out-reaching promontory, straight off to the northeast on the Isle of Shoals and away toward the north was the Portsmouth Light. Some lights burned steadily, red or white; some flashed on and off as though making a signal. Mrs. Merrill explained that each different location had its own light and method of burning it, so that a pilot, out in the ocean when he saw a light burning red, white, red white, could look on the chart and see just where that light belonged; and then, when he saw one burning white, white, red, he could look again and see where that one was.