id="Page_44" class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[44]"/> blithe and serene, had everything perfectly planned, and engineered the carrying out of the plans with quiet skill. It was she who remembered where everything was, thought of everything that ought to be taken, and saw that every one of the party was properly clad. The party, by the way, was quite a large one, consisting of another whole family (the Greys) besides the Merrithews, Will Graham, a young collegian who was a friend of Mr. Merrithew's, and Miss Covert, a rather delicate and very quiet little school-teacher whom Mrs. Merrithew had taken under her wing from sheer kindness, but who proved a charming addition to the party. The Greys were six in number: Doctor Grey, a grave professor; Mrs. Grey, a tiny, vivacious brunette, who had been Mrs. Merrithew's "chum" since their schoolgirl days; Carl and Hugh, twin boys of fourteen; and two girls, Edith, just Jackie's age, and Alice, so much older than the rest that she was "almost grown-up," and Marjorie and Dora looked upon her with admiring awe.

Doctor Grey, both mammas, Susan (who was to do the cooking, as Debby did not dare venture on anything so wild as sleeping out-of-doors), Jackie, little Edith Grey, and all the provisions, tents, and bedding, were to go by stage, while Mr. Merrithew, Will Graham, and the twins were to divide the charge of three canoes and the four girls.

At ten o'clock the big lumbering stage rattled up to the door, and the canoeists saw the others properly packed and waved them a cheerful adieu. Then they gathered up paddles, wraps, and lunch-baskets, and hastened gaily off to the boat-house on the river-bank. Here the work of embarking was quickly accomplished, and the four slender birches shot out into the stream, turned, and swept upward, propelled against the current by vigorous arms.

"Please sing, Daddy," Marjorie begged, and Mr. Merrithew promptly began an old favourite, but could get no further than the first verse.