class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[8]"/> chose the things I'd rather see and left the—the educational things for the last. You see the shops, the Hippodrome, Coney Island, Peter Pan and the Goddess of Liberty were so fascinating, and I'd wanted so long to see them, that— Well, to face the bitter truth, Uncle Cliff, we left New York without one weenty peek in at the Metropolitan Museum!"

"Horrors!" Uncle Cliff looked properly stunned. Then he said craftily, "Keep it dark, Honey. Maybe we can bluff."

Blue Bonnet shook her head. "Nobody can bluff Aunt Lucinda—I ought to know! Why—Uncle Cliff—I believe we're there!"

And "there" they certainly were. While Blue Bonnet had been busily chattering, The Wanderer had drawn in to the Woodford station.

Half the population of the village was assembled on the platform, it seemed to Blue Bonnet as she sprang from the car steps. Grandmother and Aunt Lucinda she saw first, and back of them Denham, the coachman, bearing suitcases, umbrellas, magazines and wraps, besides holding on by main force to a leash at which Solomon was straining frantically. Beside him were Katie and Delia, on hand for a final farewell to Blue Bonnet and Mrs. Clyde. Then came Kitty and Doctor Clark; Amanda and the Parkers; Sarah and the whole crowd of Blakes, big and little; Alec and the General; Debby, and a collection of sisters, cousins, uncles and aunts that overflowed the platform and straggled clear out to the line of hitching-posts, where all of Woodford's family conveyances seemed drawn up at once.

The report of Blue Bonnet's ranch party had spread like wildfire through the town, and the going away of so many of its most prominent citizens to far-off Texas, had aroused quiet Woodford to a pitch of excitement equalled only by that of a prohibition election, or a visit from the President.

Blue Bonnet was swallowed up by the crowd the moment she alighted, and it was a full five minutes before she emerged, flushed and minus her hat, to ask breathlessly, "Oh, is everybody here?—I can't see anybody for the crowd!"

"No time to lose," warned Mr. Ashe. "We must pull out in ten minutes in order to reach Boston in time for the 5.17 to-night."

Even as he spoke, The Wanderer began to move.

"Uncle Cliff," cried Blue Bonnet in a panic, "they're going without us!"

"Just switching," soothed her uncle. "The Wanderer has to be on the other track so as to hook on to the train for Boston. That's due in five minutes. Get your good-byes said so that everybody can go aboard when she comes alongside."

During that five minutes while each girl was occupied with her own family, Blue Bonnet had a moment alone with her aunt. "It's a good thing we said our real good-bye before I went to New York, isn't it, Aunt Lucinda?" she asked, slipping her hand shyly into that of her tall, prim aunt. Somehow Aunt Lucinda had never seemed so dear as in this moment of parting. Perhaps it was the look as of unshed tears in her eyes, or the flush on her usually pale face that made her seem more approachable. Blue Bonnet could not tell exactly what it was, but there was a vague something about Aunt Lucinda that made her appear almost—yes, almost, pathetic. Suddenly Blue Bonnet remembered—they were leaving Aunt Lucinda all alone. Her heart reproached her. "Aunt Lucinda," she whispered hurriedly, "won't you come, too?"

One of her rare sweet smiles lit Miss Clyde's face. "Thank you, dear—it is sweet of you to want me. But not this time, for I have promised friends to go abroad with them. I shall miss you, Blue Bonnet,—you won't forget to write often?"

"No, indeed!" Blue Bonnet assured her, at the same moment registering a solemn vow that she would write every week without fail. "And you'll write too, Aunt Lucinda? It'll be so exciting getting letters from funny, foreign places. And now it's good-bye. You—you are sure you've no—a—advice to give me?"

Miss Clyde restrained an odd smile at the significant question. "No, dear. Only this: be considerate of your grandmother, and bring her back safely to me."

"I will! I will!" cried Blue Bonnet, and with another kiss was gone.

There was only a moment for a handshake with Katie and Delia, who openly mopped their eyes at parting; a word with General Trent, a chorus of good-byes to a score of We are Seven relations, and then everybody crowded about the steps of The Wanderer.

"Grandmother first," said Blue Bonnet. "Denham, you'd better go aboard and get her settled. Here, Bennie Blake—you hold Solomon till I'm ready to take him. Now then, We are Sevens—forward!"

Suddenly Blue Bonnet gave a queer little exclamation and clapped her hand on a leather case which hung from her shoulder. "Stop, everybody, till I get a picture—I nearly forgot! And I want pictures of every stage of the ranch party. Grandmother, please stay on the top step and I'll group the girls below."

"That's right," cried Kitty. "Take one now and another when we get back, and we can label them 'Before and After Taking!'"

Sarah, Kitty, Amanda and Debby, amid the teasing remarks of sundry small boys, obediently took their places as designated by the young artist. Then Blue Bonnet's eyes turned in search of the other two girls.

"Susy! Ruth!" she called. "Why—where are they?"

An embarrassed hush fell on the group about the car. Blue Bonnet looked inquiringly at the telltale faces. It did not take her long to scent a mystery.

"What's the matter?" she cried impatiently.

Doctor Clark stepped forward, clearing his throat queerly. "Fact is, Miss Blue Bonnet," he began, "they—they can't go."

"Can't go?" Blue Bonnet started incredulously at the stammering doctor.

"No, you see,—well, in fact, they're ill," he completed lamely. Why didn't some one help him out, the doctor fumed inwardly, instead of letting him be the one to cloud that beaming face?

Suddenly Kitty leaned down from the car step and whispered: "Scarlet fever!"

"Both?" exclaimed the startled Blue Bonnet.

"No, only Ruth. But Susy was exposed and Father didn't think it safe for her to come."

"Oh, Kitty!" The tears sprang to Blue Bonnet's eyes—she fought them but they would come.

"We're all broken up over it," said Kitty with her own lips trembling; "but it might have been worse. It's only because we've been too busy to go out there, that we weren't all exposed. Then it would have been good-bye to the ranch party."

"Oh, Kitty, suppose you had!" The thought of the narrow escape dried Blue Bonnet's tears. "I'm mighty glad you four could come. But it won't be complete. And you know how I love to have things complete!"

"Never mind, Blue Bonnet, you still have me!" cried Alec, coming in with a cheerful note.

"'The poor ye have always with you!'" chimed in Kitty, and while everybody was laughing over this sally, Blue Bonnet took a snap-shot of the group, and then all the travellers trooped aboard.

Mr. Ashe looked over the heads of the chattering crowd in the car and met Mrs. Clyde's amused eye. "How do you like mothering a family of this size?" he asked jocosely.

"I fancy I feel much like the hen that hatched duck's eggs," Mrs. Clyde returned.

There was a laugh at this, in the midst of which Sarah Blake was heard to remark solemnly: "Yes, children are a great responsibility."

Whereat there was more laughter, and hardly had it subsided when from outside came the conductor's sonorous "All aboo—ard!"

"Girls, we're really going!" gasped Kitty.

There was a last vigorous waving of handkerchiefs out of the window. Suddenly a wail burst from Blue Bonnet: "Solomon! Solomon!"

All looked at one another aghast. In the excitement