It was with many misgivings that Mrs. MacIntyre and Miss Allison started
to the city one morning in April. It was the first time since the
children's coming that they had both gone away at once, and nothing but
urgent business would have made them consent to go.
The children promised at least a dozen things. They would keep away from
the barn, the live stock, the railroad, the ponds, and the cisterns.
They would not ride their wheels, climb trees, nor go off the Maclntyre
premises, and they would keep a sharp lookout for snakes and poison
ivy, in case they went into the woods for wild flowers.
[Illustration: VIRGINIA AND THE CALF.]
"Seems to me there's mighty little left that a fellow can do," said
Keith, when the long list was completed.
"Oh, the time will soon pass," said his grandmother, who was preparing
to take the eleven o'clock train. "It will soon be lunch-time. Then this
is the day for you each to write your weekly letters to your mother, and
it is so pretty in the woods now that I am sure you will enjoy looking
for violets."
Time did pass quickly, as their grandmother had said it would, until the
middle of the afternoon. Then Virginia began to wish for something more
amusing than the quiet guessing games they had been playing in the
library. The boys each picked up a book, and she strolled off up-stairs,
in search of a livelier occupation.
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