Washington?" She took the cat's head in her hands and turned it to the cage in which Jenny Lind hopped restlessly. "They aren't the friends I'd like them to be," she explained almost apologetically to her aunt. "Sometimes it worries me. Dear me, I wish I could have a talk with Noah! Don't you often wonder how he managed in the ark? It must have been hard with cats and mice and snakes and birds and lions and people. Daddy thought Noah must have been a fine animal tamer, like the one in the circus Gladys Evans' father took us to, only better, of course. Don't you think you'll like George Washington?" she asked timidly, rather puzzled by her aunt's silence.

"He's a beautiful cat," gulped Mrs. Donovan, who was more puzzled than Mary Rose. What should she do? What could she do? She took both Mary Rose and George Washington in her arms. "Listen to me, Mary Rose, for a minute. You know your Uncle Larry is janitor of this building?"

"It's a fine building," admiringly. "He must be awful rich."

"He isn't rich at all," hurriedly. "If he was he wouldn't be a janitor. A janitor is the man who takes care of it——"

"Oh," Mary Rose was frankly disappointed. "I thought he owned it."

"You see other folks live here, lots of them, an' the man who owns it won't let them have any cats or dogs," she hesitated, she hated to say it, "or childern in it. It's in the lease. A lease is the same as a law."

"Won't have any cats or dogs or children!" Mary Rose's voice was shrill with astonishment and her eyes were as big as saucers. "Why, everybody has children! They always have had. Don't you remember, even Adam and Eve? In Mifflin everyone has children."

"It's different in Waloo. You see the man who owns this house thinks childern are noisy an' destructive." She tried her best to find an excuse for the unknown owner. "He doesn't know, of course. He's probably a cross old bachelor."

"But I'm a child," wailed Mary Rose suddenly. "Wha-what are you going to do with me?" Her face whitened.

Her aunt put her hand under the little chin and turned Mary Rose's startled face up so that the two pairs of eyes looked directly into each other. "You're not a child, Mary Rose. You're a great big girl goin' on fourteen. Don't ever forget that. If anyone asks you how old you are you just tell 'em you're goin' on fourteen. That's what you are, you know."

"Yes," doubtfully. "But I have to go to eleven first and then to twelve and thirteen——"

"Waloo folks don't care about that," her aunt interrupted quickly. "They don't care to hear about any but the fourteen. Don't you ever forget."

"I won't," promised Mary Rose solemnly, too puzzled just then to think it out. "But what about George Washington? He's just a cat." She looked dubiously at George Washington and shook her head. Nothing could be made of him but a cat. "An orphan cat!" she added firmly.

"I know, dearie." Aunt Kate's arms tightened around her. "An' I hate to ask you to give him up. I know you love him but if you keep him here it may mean that your uncle will lose his job an' if he did that there wouldn't be any roof over our heads nor bread for our stomachs."

"Oh!" Mary Rose stared at her. "Would that cross old bachelor owner make him not be janitor?"

Her aunt nodded. "We'll have to find someone to take care of him—just for a while," she added quickly as she saw two big tears in Mary Rose's blue eyes. "Some day, please God, we'll have a home where we can have him with us."

Mary Rose stood very still, trying in vain to understand this strange world to which she had come, a world where children and cats and dogs were not considered precious and desirable. Suddenly a bell rang.

"That's Mrs. Rawson," murmured Aunt Kate. "I'll bet she wants me to run up an' look at her windows again. I'll be right back, Mary Rose," she promised as she hurried away to answer the insistent jangle of Mrs. Rawson's bell.

CHAPTER III

Left alone, Mary Rose caught George Washington to her heart and stood staring about the room. She shook her head. This might be a beautiful palace but she was very much afraid that she was not going to like it. She walked slowly into the next room and then to the kitchen, whose windows faced the alley.

Across the driveway she could see a broad open space, the yard of a rambling old-fashioned house. A man was cleaning an automobile and through the open window Mary Rose could hear his cheery whistle. There was something about the old-fashioned house and the spacious yard that reminded Mary Rose of Mifflin, where people loved children and had pets. The puzzled frown left her face, and clutching George Washington closer she went out of the back door and across the alley.

"If you please," she said, her heart beating so fast that she was almost choked, "would you take a cat to board?"

She had to say it a second time before the man heard her. He looked up in surprise. He had a frank, pleasant face with twinkling eyes and Mary Rose liked him at once.

"Hullo, brother," he said, quite as cordially as a Mifflin man would have spoken. "And where did you drop from?"

"I didn't drop," answered literal Mary Rose. "I came across the alley," and she nodded toward the big apartment house. It now turned a white brick face to her. Mary Rose almost forgot her errand when she saw that. In Mifflin houses were the same color all the way around. "Why—why, it's two-faced!" she cried. "The front is all red and now the back is all white. It's just like an enchanted palace."

"It is an enchanted palace," grumbled the man.

Mary Rose flew to his side. "Oh, is there a princess there? A beautiful princess?" she begged.

The man colored under the tan the sun and wind had spread over his face. "There is," he admitted, "a most beautiful princess."

"And a witch?" insisted Mary Rose. "A wicked witch?" The color flew into her face also.

"The wickedest witch that could ever enslave a beautiful princess. Her darned old name is Independence!"

Mary Rose did not understand and she thought it was an odd name for a witch but she wished to know more. "And is the prince there?" she demanded thirstily.

The man's face turned redder than before. "The prince is here," he said sadly. "Right here. And he might as well be in Jericho," he added under his breath.

"I've heard the Presbyterian minister speak of Jericho but I never read of it in any fairy-tale. Oh, dear! I hope the prince won't go there. I want him to stay here and rescue the pretty princess from that wicked witch In-independence," she stumbled over the unfamiliar word.

The man looked at her. He had to look away down to find her, for he was tall, over six feet, and Mary Rose was not much more than half that, but when he finally did find her Mary Rose was amazed to see the look of determination that came into his sunburned face.

"He'll do it," he said, half under his breath. "It's all very well for a girl to be independent, but she needn't be so darned independent that she won't listen to a word a man says."

"I don't think I understand," Mary Rose ventured to say when there was a long pause.

Her new friend laughed. "No, of course, you don't." He put his hands on her shoulders. "As man to man," he said, "the modern girl is getting to be almost too much of a problem for the modern man. I don't suppose you understand that, either. But wait ten or fifteen years and you will. Godfrey! I feel sorry for you. If they keep on as they've started what will they be in ten years? Did you say you were living over there?" He looked toward the white wall.

Mary Rose nodded her yellow head. "I thought perhaps you might like to take a cat to board. An orphan cat," she explained pityingly.

Jerry Longworthy swallowed a laugh when he saw that there was real trouble in her face. "Suppose you climb into the car and tell me why you're looking for a boarding place for an orphan cat?"

Mary Rose