"Well, I like that," bridled Tilly. "Just think—not go until the fifth!"

"Oh, but just think of going at all," comforted Alma Lane, hurriedly; "and in sleepers, too! Sleepers are loads of fun. I rode in one fifty miles, once—it wasn't in the night, though."

"I rode in one at night!" Tilly's voice rose dominant, triumphant.

"My stars!"

"When?"

"Where?"

"What was it like?"

"Was it fun?"

"Why didn't you tell us?"

Tilly laughed in keen enjoyment of the commotion she had created.

"Don't you wish you knew?" she teased. "Just you wait and see!"

"Yes, but, Tilly, do they lay you down on a little narrow shelf, really?" worried Cordelia.

"I sha'n't take off a single thing, anyhow," announced Bertha, with decision, "not even my shoes. I'm just sure there'll be an accident!"

Tilly laughed merrily.

"A fine traveler you'll make, Bertha," she scoffed. "Sleepers are made to sleep in, young lady—not to lie awake and worry in, for fear there'll be an accident and you'll lose your shoes. As for you, Cordy, and the shelf you're fretting over—there are shelves, in a way; but you lay yourself down on them, my child. Nobody else does it for you."

"Thank you," returned Cordelia, a little stiffly. Cordelia did not like to be called "my child"—specially by Tilly, who was not quite sixteen, and who was the youngest member of the club.

"But, Tilly, are—are sleepers nice, daytimes?" asked Edith Wilson, who, as usual, was hovering near. "I should think they'd be lovely for nights—but I wouldn't like to have to lie down all day!"

Tilly laughed so hard at this that Edith grew red of face indeed before Alma patched matters up and made peace.

It was the trip to Texas that was the all-absorbing topic of discussion that day; and it was the trip to Texas that Cordelia Wilson was thinking of as she walked slowly home that night after leaving the girls at the corner.

"I wonder—" she began just under her breath; then stopped short. An old man, known as "Uncle Bill Hodges," stood directly in her path.

"Miss Cordelia, I—I want to speak to ye, just a minute," he stammered.

"Yes, sir." Cordelia smiled politely.

The old man threw a suspicious glance over his shoulder, then came a step nearer.

"I ain't tellin' this everywhere, Miss Cordelia, and I don't want you to say nothin'. You're goin' to Texas, they tell me."

"Yes, Mr. Hodges, I am." Cordelia tried to make her voice sound properly humble, but pride would vibrate through it.

"Well, I—" The man hesitated, looked around again suspiciously, then blurted out a storm of words with the rush of desperation. "I—years ago, Miss Cordelia, I let a man in Boston have a lot of money. He said 'twas goin' into an oil well out in Texas, and that when it came back there'd be a lot more with it a-comin' to me. So I let him have it. I liked Texas, anyhow—I'd been there as a boy."

"Yes," nodded Cordelia, smiling as she remembered the prairie schooner that was Fred's "boat."

"Well, for a while I did get money—dividends, he called 'em. Then it all stopped off short. They shut the man up in prison, and closed the office. And there's all my money! They do be sayin', too, that there ain't no such place as this oil well there—that is, not the way he said it was—so big and fine and promisin'. Well, now, of course I can't go to see, Miss Cordelia—an old man like me, all the way to Texas. But you are goin'. So I thought I'd just ask you to look around a little if you happened to hear anything about this well. Maybe you could go and see it, and then tell me. I've written down the name on this paper," finished the man, thrusting his trembling fingers into his pocket, and bringing out a small piece of not over-clean paper.

"Why, of—of course, Mr. Hodges," promised Cordelia, doubtfully, as she took the paper. "I'd love to do anything I could for you—anything! Only I'm afraid I don't know much about oil wells, you see. Do they look just like—water wells, with a pump or a bucket? Bertha's aunt has one of those on her farm."

"I don't know, child, I don't know," murmured the old man, shaking his head sadly, as he turned away. "Sometimes I think there ain't any such things, anyhow. But you'll do your best, I know. I can trust you!"

"Why, of course," returned Cordelia, earnestly, slipping the bit of paper into the envelope of Genevieve's letter in her hand.

In her own room that night Cordelia Wilson got out her list marked "Things to do in Texas," and studied it with troubled eyes. She had now one more item to add to it—and it was already so long!

She had started the list for her own benefit. Then had come the request from queer old Hermit Joe to be on the lookout for his son who had gone years ago to Texas. After that, commissions for others followed rapidly. So many people had so many things they wanted her to do in Texas!—and nobody wanted them talked about in Sunbridge.

Slowly, with careful precision, she wrote down this last one. Then, a little dubiously, she read over the list.

See the blue bonnet—the Texas state flower. Find out if it really is shaped like a bonnet.

Bring home a piece of prairie grass.

See a real buffalo.

Find Hermit Joe's son, John, who ran away to Texas twenty years ago.

See an Osage orange hedge.

See a broncho bursted (obviously changed over from "busted").

Find out for Mrs. Miller if cowboys do shoot at sight, and yell always without just and due provocation.

See a mesquite tree.

Inquire if any one has seen Mrs. Snow's daughter, Lizzie, who ran away with a Texas man named Higgins.

Pick a fig.

See a rice canal.

Find out what has become of Mrs. Granger's cousin, Lester Goodwin, who went to Texas fourteen years ago.

See cotton growing and pick a cotton boll, called "Texas Roses."

See peanuts growing.

Inquire for James Hunt, brother of Miss Sally Hunt.

See a real Indian.

Look at oil well for Mr. Hodges, and see if there is any there.

"Now if I can just fix all those people's names in my mind," mused Cordelia, aloud; "and seems as if I might—there are only four. John Sanborn, Lizzie Higgins, Lester Goodwin, and James Hunt," she chanted over and over again. She was still droning the same refrain when she fell asleep that night.

CHAPTER III

THE COMING OF GENEVIEVE

Genevieve was to arrive in Sunbridge at three o'clock on the afternoon of the third of July. Her father was to remain in Boston until one of the evening trains. The Happy Hexagons, knowing Genevieve's plans, decided to give her a welcome befitting the club and the occasion. They invited Harold Day, of course, to join them.

Harold laughed good-humoredly.

"Oh, I'll be there all right, at the station," he assured them. "I've got Mrs. Kennedy's permission to bring her up to the house; but I don't think I'll join in on your show. I'll let you girls do that."

The girls pouted a little, but they were too excited to remain long out of humor.

"Don't our dresses look pretty! I know Genevieve'll be pleased," sighed Elsie Martin, as, long before the train was due that afternoon, the girls arrived at the station.

"Of course she'll be pleased," cried Alma Lane. "She can't help it. I can hear her laugh and clap her hands now, when she sees us—and hears us!"

"So can I," echoed Bertha. "And how her eyes will dance! I love to see Genevieve's eyes