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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Blue Bonnet in Boston

CHAPTER I

THE WAIL OF THE WE ARE SEVENS

Blue Bonnet raised the blind of the car window, which had been drawn all the afternoon to shut out the blazing sun, and took a view of the flying landscape. Then she consulted the tiny watch at her wrist and sat up with a start.

"Grandmother!" she said excitedly, "we'll soon be in Woodford; that is, in just an hour. We're on time, you know. Hadn't we better be getting our things together?"

Mrs. Clyde straightened up from the pillows, which Blue Bonnet had arranged comfortably for her afternoon nap, and peered out at the rolling hills and green meadow-lands.

"I think we have plenty of time, Blue Bonnet," she said, smiling into the girl's eager face. "But perhaps we would better freshen up a bit. You are sure we are on time?"

"Yes, I asked the conductor when I went back to see Solomon at the last station. Four-twenty sharp, at Woodford, he told Solomon, and Solomon licked his hand with joy. Poor doggie! I don't believe he appreciates the value of travel, even if he has seen Texas and New York and Boston. He loathes the baggage-car, though I must say the men all along the way have been perfectly splendid to him. But then, any one would fall in love with Solomon, he's such a dear."

Mrs. Clyde recalled the five dollar bill she had witnessed Mr. Ashe pass to the baggage-man at the beginning of the journey, and the money she had given by his instruction along the way, and wondered how much Solomon's real worth had contributed to his care.

"I'm so glad we're arriving in the afternoon," Blue Bonnet said, as she gathered up magazines and various other articles that littered the section. "There's something so flat about getting anywhere in the morning—nothing to do but sit round waiting for trunks that have been delayed, and wander about the house. I wonder if Aunt Lucinda told the girls we were coming?"

Mrs. Clyde fancied not. A quiet home-coming after so strenuous a summer was much to be desired.

Blue Bonnet and the We Are Sevens had parted company in New York several weeks before, the girls going on to Woodford in care of the General, in order not to miss the first week of school.

The stay in New York had been particularly gratifying to Blue Bonnet, for there had been ample time while waiting for Aunt Lucinda to arrive from her summer's outing in Europe, to do some of the things left undone on her last visit. A day at the Metropolitan Museum proved a delight; the shops fascinating—especially Tiffany's, where Blue Bonnet spent hours over shining trays, mysterious designs in monograms, and antique gold settings, leaving an order that quite amazed Grandmother Clyde, until she learned that the purchase was for Uncle Cliff.

Then there had been a delightful week with the Boston relatives, Aunt Lucinda going straight to Woodford to open the house and make things comfortable for her mother's arrival.

Cousin Tracy, as on that other memorable visit, had proved an ideal host. To be sure, a motor car had been substituted for the sightseeing bus so dear to Blue Bonnet's heart, but she found it, on the whole, quite as enjoyable, and confided to Cousin Tracy as they sped through the crooked little streets or walked through the beloved Common, that she liked Boston ever so much better than New York, it seemed so nice and countrified. There was a second visit to Bunker Hill and the Library, to which Blue Bonnet brought fresh enthusiasm, more stories of Cousin Tracy's coins and medals, and so the days passed all too swiftly.

"Well, at last!" Blue Bonnet exclaimed, as the train began to slacken speed and the familiar "Next stop Woodford" echoed through the car. "Here we are, Grandmother, home again!" She was at the door before the car came to a standstill.

"Doesn't look as exciting as it did when Uncle Cliff and I arrived in the Wanderer, does it?" Blue Bonnet's eyes swept the almost deserted station.

Miss Clyde stood at the end of the long platform, her eyes turned expectantly toward the rear Pullman, with Denham, the coachman, at a respectful distance.

Blue Bonnet sprang from the car steps, greeted Aunt Lucinda affectionately, shook hands with Denham and rushed for the baggage-car to release Solomon.

"He's perfectly wild to see you, Aunt Lucinda," she called back, as she ran toward the car—a compliment which Solomon himself verified a moment later with joyful leaps and yelps and much wagging of tail.

"My, but it seems nice to get home," Blue Bonnet said as she sank back cosily in the carriage and heaved a sigh of content. The sigh shamed her a little. It seemed, somehow, disloyal to Uncle Cliff and Texas. She sat up straight and turned her head away from the houses with their trim orderly dooryards and well-kept hedges, and, for a moment, fixed her mind with passionate loyalty on the lonely wind-swept stretches of her native state; the battered and weatherbeaten ranch-house, Benita—But only for a moment. The green rolling hills, the giant arching elms, Grandmother's stately house just coming into view, proved too alluring, and salving her