“Now listen to me,” said Jack suddenly, in such an earnest voice that all three children turned to him at once. “If I tell you a very great secret will you promise never to say a word about it to anyone?”
"Oh, yes, Jack, we promise,” said all three.
“You can trust us, Jack,” said Mike.
“I know I can,” he said. “Well, listen. I know a place where nobody could find us - if we ran away!”
“Where is it, Jack?” they all cried in great excitement.
“I’ll show you this evening,” said Jack, getting up. “Be by the lakeside at eight o’clock, when all your work is done, and I’ll meet you there. I must go now, or Granpa will be angry with me, and perhaps lock me into my room so that I can’t get out again to-day.”
“Good-bye, Jack,” said Nora, who was feeling much better now. "We’ll see you this evening.”
Jack ran off, and the three children made their way slowly back to Uncle Henry’s farm. They had taken their dinner out into the fields to eat - now they had to go back to work. Nora had a great deal of ironing to do, and Peggy had to clean the kitchen. It was a big stone kitchen, and Peggy knew it would take her until supper-time - and, oh dear, how tired she would be then! Aunt Harriet would scold her all the time, she knew.
“I’ve got to go and clean out the barn,” said Mike to the girls, "but I’ll be in at supper-time, and afterwards we’ll see about this great secret of Jack’s.”
They each began their work, but all the time they were thinking excitedly of the evening. What was Jack’s secret? Where was the place he knew of? Could they really and truly run away?