The girls settled themselves comfortably by the big fire, and opened their knitting bags.
“Now, I call this fine!” declared Herron; “what’s nicer than to have you girls sit and knit and we men sit and look at you!”
“There’s nothing nicer to look at,” said Helen complacently, “on that we’re all agreed. Now, make yourselves entertaining, and we’ll call it square.”
Pretty Helen’s gay face bent over her khaki-coloured wool, and her needles clicked bravely in an effort to knit faster than Patty. And she did, but it was only a spurt. She dropped a stitch, and exclaimed, “Hold on, Patty, no fair your knitting when I’m picking up this stitch! You wait now!”
“Not so; a dropped stitch in time loses nine! Come on, hare, catch up with this old tortoise!”
Calmly, Patty proceeded with her steadily-moving needles, and again Helen made an hysterical burst of speed and caught up as to distance. But her wool snarled somehow, and Herron, trying to help her, made it worse, and the four hands that tried to untangle it only drew it into tighter knots.
Helen burst out laughing, and awarded Patty the palm.
“It’s always so,” she acknowledged. “I fly at a thing and tumble all over myself, and accomplish just about nothing. Patty goes about it leisurely, and comes in at the last, easily winner, and with a big lot of work to her credit.”
“You flatter me, angel child,” Patty smiled. “I knit because I love to knit, and I get a lot done, because I don’t try to beat everybody else. There, how’s that for a helmet? I rather guess some one of Our Boys will be glad to wear it!”
“I shouldn’t mind myself,” suggested Herron, timidly, and Patty replied at once, “Then you shall have it! I’ll fit it to your head now.”