"Let's not care what we say," Elizabeth said. "I do love Jean. Grandmother always says it doesn't make any difference how many children a woman has, she always has a different place in her heart for every one. I guess that's the way it is with friends. None of them can occupy the same place."
"I only have one in my place," said Peggy, "you are my most intimate friend and I am not yours. Well, I guess I'll have to get reconciled to it."
"I have two most intimate friends," said Elizabeth, "don't cry, Peggy."
"Well, you're crying yourself, that's something. It's—it's a great deal."
"Good-bye," said Elizabeth, "there's Buddy's horn again."
"Good-bye," said Peggy. "Oh, I won't say good-bye. I—I guess I'll come over there and see you off."
"She won't," Elizabeth thought, "she's just saying that to postpone the evil hour. All right, Peggy, dear," she said aloud, "good-bye till—good-bye!" and she flung her arms around Peggy's neck in a suffocating embrace.
In the old valanced rocking chairs before the living-room windows Grandfather and Grandmother Swift sat alone in the gathering darkness.
"House seems kinder lonesome to-night, don't it, Mother? Hard lines to lose the whole family all to once. They ought to gone off one by one, so's we wouldn't notice it so much."