"I'm only afraid it wasn't Marjorie," returned Mr. Bryant. "But we shall soon know."
Marjorie had worked hard all day. Partly because she wanted to prove herself a good worker, and partly because, if she stopped to think, her troubles seemed greater than she could bear.
But a little after five o'clock everything was done, supper prepared, and the child sat down on the kitchen steps to rest. She was tired, sad, and desolate. The slight excitement of novelty was gone, the bravery and courage of the morning hours had disappeared, and a great wave of homesickness enveloped her very soul. She was too lonely and homesick even to cry, and she sat, a pathetic, drooped little figure, on the old tumble-down porch.
She heard the toot of a motor-horn, but it was a familiar sound to her, and she paid no attention to it. Then she heard it again, very near, and looked up to see her father and Cousin Jack frantically waving, as the car fairly flew, over many minor obstacles, straight to that kitchen doorway.
"Marjorie!" cried Mr. Maynard, leaping out before the wheels had fairly stopped turning, and in another instant she was folded in that dear old embrace.
"Oh, Father, Father!" she cried, hysterically clinging to him, "take me home, take me home!"
"Of course I will, darling," said Mr. Maynard's quivering voice, as he held her close and stroked her hair with trembling fingers. "That's what we've come for. Here's Cousin Jack, too."
And then Midget felt more kisses on her forehead, and a hearty pat on her back, as a voice, not quite steady, but determinedly cheerful, said: "Brace up now, Mehitabel, we want you to go riding with us."
Marjorie looked up, with a sudden smile, and then again buried her face on her father's shoulder and almost strangled him as she flung her arms round his neck. Then she drew his head down, while she whispered faintly in his ear. Three times she had to repeat the words before he could catch them: