Carrie did most of the talking on that walk, and it did not seem to exhaust her at all. When the Riddle Club reached the town, she accompanied them to the post-office, and when Fred said something to Polly about going home another way, she declared that she would love to go.
"I like to walk; and, anyway, you'll have to take me home for I don't know my way," she said. "I'll tell you—let's go as far as your cottage and I'll see your folks and then you can walk back to the bungalow with me."
No one was especially pleased with this plan, but there did not seem to be any reason for rejecting it. So, a little glumly, the Riddle Club members marched home again, Carrie going with them. Fred was a bit ashamed of himself when he saw how pleasantly his mother greeted Carrie. Mrs. Marley brought out ice-cold ginger ale for them, and Mr. Larue, who was going to run the car out to a farm and back, to make arrangements for the delivery of vegetables, offered to take Carrie back to the bungalow colony.
"It's a kind of nice house," said Carrie wistfully, when she was ready to go. "I suppose a crowd can have lots of fun in a place like this. You can't make a bit of noise in Mrs. Helms' bungalow, because the neighbors can hear you. And they play their phonographs sometimes till midnight, Mr. Helms says. I like this big yard."
"Come and see us whenever you feel like it, Carrie," Mrs. Williamson said, as Carrie went down the steps.
"Oh, Mother!" Margy hardly waited till the car had rounded the corner.
"Oh, Daughter!"
"What made you say that?" wailed Margy. "Now she'll be here all the time and spoil all our fun."
"No, she won't, Margy," Mrs. Williamson comforted her. "She will be too busy with Mattie to bother you very much. But her mother is a neighbor of ours, and Carrie might be lonely or home-sick down here and need old friends. You wouldn't want to be away from home, would you, and have old friends treat you unkindly?"
"I could stand her if she was lonely or home-sick," the rebellious Margy protested. "But all she does is to talk about Mattie's clothes."