(3) A pair of bronze evening shoes, embroidered with emerald butterflies.
- A pair of old-paste buckles set in silver.
"It seems a shame to send them," said Haidee, stroking the orange velvet hood, the dawn of femininity in her eye. "They 're so awfully nice. I 'm sure they 're worth more than a pen of Langshans, Val."
"Yes, I know," said Val, gazing at the ball gown wistfully. "But where could I sell them, Haidee? One can't go hawking clothes for sale round Jersey. And we must have the fowls and we must n't spend Garry's money on experiments. Besides it is better to get rid of things like these, they only make one think of balls and motors and frivolous things that don't matter a bit."
Haidee looked at her curiously.
"Just fancy you ever having gone to balls, Val--and ridden in motors! I would never have believed it! I can't think of you in anything else but your big grey overall aprons."
Val flushed painfully. The grey overalls were a concomitant feature of life in New York only, but Haidee was not to know that.
"At any rate we 'll send the things. Now let us see what we can dig out in exchange for this pair of Belgian hares--they say they are the best kind for increasing and marketing. Oh, Haidee! perhaps we shall be able to make quite a lot of money!"
If they did not it would not be the fault of either of them, for they threw themselves heart and soul into the affairs of the farm. Val fed the fowls at early dawn, made hot mashes for them on cold mornings, cleaned out nests perpetually, ground up old china to make grit, and set broody hens on several dozen eggs, so as to have chickens ready for the spring markets. There was nothing she and Haidee disdained to do.
On cold winter nights when Bran was asleep they would sit curled over the fire calculating the fortunes they were going to make out of their chickens and computing the large sums that would presently come rolling in when the breeding pen was in full swing, the spring chickens hatched, and all the hens laying simultaneously. To make money at poultry farming seemed as easy as rolling off a log.