“Do you like to play dress-up?” asked the man.
“’Deed we do!” exclaimed Mary Jane heartily; “we like it most the best of anything!”
“Then you take these head-dresses you wore and keep them with my compliments,” he said, and that is how it happened that two fine and interesting bits of Spanish lace were taken home from the southern trip.
“Mother!” exclaimed Alice when they were out on the street again, “did you ever hear of such fun? And to think it happened to us!”
“Being in a movie!” cried Mary Jane, “and riding a pony and swimming in a house—why just everything’s happening to us! If Dadah doesn’t come with us pretty soon there won’t be anything left in the world to do.”
“Don’t you worry about that,” laughed Mrs. Merrill; “I know two or three things left in the world to do. And it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if you’d do them some day. But the thing we’re doing right now, is seeing the oldest house in the United States. Alice, will you pound the knocker?”
They stopped short and there, sure enough, they had come to the queer, old house they had set out to see. Alice stepped up on the doorsill and awesomely pounded at the brass knocker. A pleasant faced old lady opened the door and peered out at them.
“Why, don’t I know you?” she asked as she spied Mrs. Merrill.
“I hoped you’d remember,” replied Mrs. Merrill, “though I don’t see how you do when you see so many folks every year. And I hoped you’d let my girls and me eat lunch by the old well as I did years ago.”
“Indeed I will that,” said the old lady cordially, “and they may pick flowers in my garden, too, though that’s something very few folks are allowed to do. But first they want to see the house.”