“It is just the spot for us,” Mrs. Ford declared; “a place where I can turn the children loose, and know that they are safe.”
Mabel turned a beaming face toward Harold. “Do you hear that?” she exclaimed. “We’ll be turned loose, and I can go fishing, and I can climb trees and fences, and play all sorts of boy plays, without having the girls think I am a tom-boy. Oh, won’t it be fun? And we will be together all summer, and in the fall—” she looked at Captain Evans.
“Oh, that’s too far to think about now,” he answered, “but if the war is over, and if I am spared, I shall be able to make my plans more readily than I can now.”
“I hope the people will be nice and kind on the farm and will let me have Don,” said Harold.
“That is the only difficulty,” his father told him. “I’m afraid you cannot take Don with you, but Drake has promised to take charge of him, and if all goes well you can have him again when you get back. It is too bad, I know,” he continued, seeing how disappointed Harold looked, “but you would have had to leave him anyhow, if you had gone to your aunt’s, for she would not have received the dog, I know.”
“Why can’t I take Don to the farm?” inquired Harold, still hoping for consent.
“Because Mrs. Knight doesn’t allow dogs on the place. She has a favorite cat, and, at first, was hardly willing to take a boy. For some reason she doesn’t approve of boys or dogs, but Mrs. Ford seems to have overcome her objections.”
“Mrs. Knight!” Mabel exclaimed. “Oh, mamma, is it our Mrs. Knight? Deborah Knight? She was going to move into the country; I remember. Has she gone? Is it to her house we are going? I do hope it is.”
“Yes, it is your Deborah Knight,” her mother told her. “I was going to keep it as a little surprise for you, but it doesn’t matter. As soon as she is settled on her farm, she is to let us know. When I saw her, and told her who I was, she immediately remembered you and Harold, and consented at once to take us all into her home. She has a large house, and thinks she will be rather lonely there, and seemed really pleased at the idea of having ‘those two kind and tender children,’ as she calls you.”
“Is she going to be a farmer herself? How can she, when she is lame?” Mabel asked.