"Oh, it is so hard to explain things in a letter," answered Malcolm,
"and being off there, he'd say that grandmother and all the grown people
certainly know best. But if he could see Jonesy,--how pitiful looking he
is, and hear him crying to go back to his brother, I know he'd feel the
way we do about it."
"I called the professor out in the hall, and told him so," said Keith,
"and asked him if he couldn't adopt Jonesy, or something, until papa
comes home. But he said that he is too poor. He has only a few dollars a
month to live on. I didn't mind asking him. He smiled in that big, kind
way he always does. He said Jonesy was lots of company, and he would
like to keep him this summer, if he could afford it, and let him get
well and strong out here in the country."
"Then he would keep him till Uncle Sydney comes, if somebody would pay
his board?" asked Virginia.
"Yes," said Malcolm, "but that doesn't help matters much, for we
children are the only ones who want him to stay, and our monthly
allowances, all put together, wouldn't be enough."
"We might earn the money ourselves," suggested Virginia, after awhile,
breaking a long silence.
"How?" demanded Malcolm. "Now, Ginger, you know, as well as I do, there
is no way for us to earn anything this time of year. You can't pick
fruit in the dead of winter, can you? or pull weeds, or rake leaves?
What other way is there?"
"We might go to every house in the valley, and exhibit the bear," said
Keith, "taking up a collection each time.
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