suspicious bulge that forced the paper out, and casting his eye at the ceiling which was veined with hair cracks.

"Probably the walls will not be in the pink Of condition," returned Mrs. Morton; "but, even so, color-washing will be better than papering."

"We can go over them and fill up the cracks," suggested Tom, "and we can whitewash the ceilings."

"That's what I should advise," said Miss Merriam. "Put the walls and ceilings in as good condition as you can, and then put on your wash. Kalsomining is rather expensive, but there are plenty of color washes now that any one can put on who can wield a whitewash brush."

"Me for the whitewash brush at an early date," Roger sang gayly. "What do you suggest for these upstairs floors, Miss Merriam? Grandfather thought they weren't bad enough to have new ones laid, but they do look rather rocky, don't they?"

He cast a disparaging glance at the boards under his feet, and waited for help.

"Were you planning to paint them?"

"Yes," Roger nodded.

"Then you ought to putty up the cracks first. That will make them smooth enough. They're not really rough, you see. It's the spaces between the planks that make them seem so."

"That's easily done. We thought we'd paint these old floors and stain the new ones down stairs."

"I'd do that. Paint these floors tan or gray, if you want them to confess frankly that they're painted floors, or the shade of some wood if you want to pretend that they're hard wood floors."

James moved uneasily. Roger guessed the reason.

"What's the matter, old man? Treasury low?"

"It always is," answered James uncomfortably. "How are we going to fill it?" "That's what I've been thinking," Ethel Brown said meditatively. "It's time we did something to earn something."

"Everybody I've sold cookies to all winter seems to have stopped eating them," complained Ethel Brown. "I'm thinking of getting up a cooky sale to relieve my financial distress."

"There's an idea," cried Tom. "Why can't we have a cooky sale--with a few other things thrown in--and use the proceeds for the decoration and furnishing of Rose House?"

"We've had so many entertainments; can we do anything different enough for the Rosemonters to be willing to come?"

"And spend?"

"I think the Rosemonters have great confidence in our getting up something new and interesting; ditto the Glen Pointers," insisted Margaret who lived at Glen Point and knew the opinions of her neighbors.

"Where could we have it--it meaning our sale or whatever we decide to have?"

"Why not have it here? Let's wait until the boys have the house all painted and whitewashed and colorwashed so it looks as fresh as possible, and then tell the town what it is we are trying to do this summer, and ask them over here to see what it looks like."

"Good enough. When they see that it's good as far as it goes, but that our Fresh Air people will be mighty uncomfortable if they don't have some beds to sleep in and a few other trifles of every day use, they'll buy whatever we have to sell. That's the way it seems to me," and Roger threw himself down on the grass before the front door with an air of having said the final word.

"Let's ask the people of Rosemont to come to Rose House to a Rose Fête," cried Ethel Blue, while every one of her hearers waved his handkerchief at the suggestion.

"I'll draw a poster with the announcement on it," she went on, "and we can have it printed on pink paper and the boys can go round on their bicycles and distribute them at every house."

"We must have everything pink, of course. Pink ice cream and cakes with pink icing--"

"And pink strawberries--"

"Not green ones! No, sir!"

"And watermelons if we can get some that won't make too much trouble for Dr. Hancock."

"How are we going to serve them? We can't bring china way out here--and we won't have any for Rose House until after we give this party to earn it!"

"They have paper plates with pretty patterns on them now. And if they cost too much we might get the plain ones and lay a d'oyley of pink paper on each one," suggested Margaret.

"Probably that will be the cheapest and the effect will be just as good, but I'll find out the prices in town," promised Delia.

"I have a scheme for a table of fancy things," offered Dorothy. "Let's have it under that tree over there and over it let's hang a huge rose. I think I know how to make it--two hoops, the kind Dicky rolls, one above the other, the smaller one on top, and both suspended from the tree. Cover them inside and out with big pink paper petals."

"How are you going to make it look like a rose and not a pink bell?" inquired Delia.

"Put a green calyx on the top and some yellow stamens inside and then make a stem that will look like the real thing, only gigantic."

"How will you manage that?"

"Do you remember those wild grape vines that Helen and Ethel Brown found in the West Woods and used for Hallowe'en decorations? If we could get a thick one and wind it with green paper and let it curve from the rose toward the ground it ought to look like a real stem."

"We could hang the rose with dark string that wouldn't show, and fasten the stem to the branch of the tree with a pink bow. It would look as if some giant had tied it there for his ladylove."

"I have an old pink sash I'll contribute to the good cause," laughed Helen. "I've been wondering what to do with it for some time."

"Everything on the table must be pink and shaped like a rose or decorated with roses--cushions, pen-wipers, baskets, stencilled bureau sets--there are a thousand things to be made."

"Boxes covered with rose paper," suggested James solemnly.

Everybody shouted, for James's imagination always seemed to be stimulated whenever he saw a chance to make something with paste-pot and brush.

"How about music?"

This question brought silence, for it was not easy to arrange for music in the open.

"I wish Edward and his violin were here," said Delia, referring to her brother, Dr. Watkins, who had recently gone to Oklahoma to assist an older physician in a flourishing town there. He had been very attentive to Miss Merriam and she was annoyed to find herself blushing at the mention of his name. Ethel Blue, who had been in his confidence, was the only one of the young people who glanced at her, however, so her annoyance passed unnoticed.

"He isn't, and a piano is out of the question. I wonder, if Greg Patton would bring his fiddle?"

"Why didn't we think of him before! He and some of the other high school boys have been getting up a little orchestra; I shouldn't wonder a bit if they'd be glad to help--glad of the experience of playing in public."

"We haven't got to make oceans of paper roses, this time," remarked Ethel Brown gratefully. "Nature is doing the work for us."

She waved her hand at the clump of bushes which was to conceal Dorothy's fortune telling operations, and which was pink with blossoms.

"Our bushes at home are loaded down with them, too," said Margaret. "Everybody's are, so I don't suppose it would be worth while to have a flower table."

"There's no harm in trying. We could say on the poster that exceptionally choice roses will be on exhibition and sale and--and why couldn't we take orders for the bushes? Use the beauties for samples and if people like them, get roots from the bushes they came from and supply them the next day!" Ethel Blue was quite breathless with the force of this suggestion and the others applauded it.

"Just as I think of Ethel Blue as all imagination and dreams she comes out with something practical like that and I have to study her all over again," said Roger, observing his cousin with his head on one side. Ethel Blue threw a leaf at him which he dodged with exaggerated fear.

They decided to have the Rose Fête just as soon as the boys put the house into presentable condition, and then the