"Possibly; I don't know. She's like a mother puss with her kitten. One minute she pets him to foolishness, the next she gives him a mental slap that reduces him to the humblest, most timid mood. Well, I'm glad the burro business is settled, though it's odd how Fayette covets that animal; and the exercise of going up and down to his work, the days he has to go, isn't hurting Hallam at all. I never knew him to be so well and strong as he seems this spring."
"Amy, how was it about Balaam? Ma says she never heard the rights of it yet. And say, she likes that book you lent her, about the woman went round the world alone, visiting them hospitals, better 'n any novel she ever read. She's going to give up the other story papers soon as the subscription runs out an' take one o' them library tickets you were telling about, or your uncle, where they send the books to you by mail and you can have your choose of hundreds. Say, wouldn't it be prime if we could get a big library here?"
"Grand! We will, some day, too."
"My! You say such things as if you expected them to be. How, I'd like to know?"
"Well, if in no other way, by just us mill folks banding together and making a beginning. Indeed, I think my father would give his own little library as a start. There's a fine one at Fairacres, and I'm hoping when Cousin Archibald comes back he'll get interested in our work and help along."
"Might as well look for miracles."
"I do. I'm always finding them, too. There's one at your very feet. Don't tread upon it, please."
Stooping, the girl pulled Gwendolyn's dress away from a tiny green speck, growing in dangerous proximity to the wood road.
"What's it?"