That settled it! Agnes would not listen to him any further.
“Say! I’ll give Dot my bicycle if you’ll let me go,” he urged on Ruth.
“I’d be afraid to have her ride it,” laughed Ruth. “The only thing you ever did give the little girls, Sammy—that goat—has been a dreadful annoyance.”
“Give us your bulldog, Sammy?” suggested Agnes, knowing that the very soul of the boy was knit to that ugly, bandy-legged beast.
“Ow!” groaned Sammy. He could not agree to that. “I tell you I’ll do anything you want me to——”
“Stay at home, then, and don’t bother us,” said Ruth, somewhat tartly for her.
“Aw, do say I can go, Aggie,” he pleaded for the last time with the other sister.
“I’d like to see you find room aboard that car!” cried Agnes, having finally packed the last bag and parcel in the tonneau.
At these words Sammy shot away like a rabbit and disappeared. Mrs. Heard and the little girls came out. Everybody else from the Corner House appeared to bid the party good-bye—even Aunt Sarah.
“It’ll rain before you get far,” prophesied this last person, grimly, “and you’ll have to come back.”