Life was very full for the Hollisters in those days, and those who went to the city for the day could hardly bear to tear themselves away from the many delights of the country. The puppy was getting bigger and wiser every day, tagging Doris and Harley wherever they went, or sitting adoringly at Mrs. Hollister's feet; always bounding out to meet the evening trolley on which George and Shirley came, and always attending them to the trolley in the morning.
Out behind the barn a tiny coop held a white hen and her seven little downy balls of chickens. Another hen was happily ensconced in a barrel of hay with ten big blue duck-eggs under her happy wings, and a little further down toward the creek a fine chicken-run ended in a trig little roosting-place for the poultry, which George had manufactured out of a packing-box and some boards. The feathered family had been increased by two white Leghorns and three bantams. George and Harley spent their evenings watching them and discussing the price of eggs and chickens per pound. They were all very happy.
Elizabeth came out to spend Sunday as she had promised. She got up early to see the sun rise and watch the birds. She helped get breakfast and wash the dishes. Then she went with the others across the fields to the little white church in the valley to Sunday-school and church. She was as hungry and eager as any of them when she came home, and joyfully helped to do the work, taking great pride in the potatoes she was allowed to warm up under careful tutelage. In the afternoon there was no more eager listener among them to the Bible story Shirley told to Doris and the book she read aloud to them all afterward; her voice was sweetest and clearest of them all in the hymns they sang together; and she was most eager to go with Shirley to the Christian Endeavor service.
"I shouldn't wonder if Sidney wishes he was here too," she remarked dreamily that evening, as she sat before the fire on a little cushion, her chin in her hands, her eyes on the fantastic shadows in the ashes.
She went to school with Carol the next morning, came home with her in the afternoon, and when her brother came for her in the evening she was most reluctant to go home to the big, lonely, elegant house again, and begged that Carol might soon come and see her.
Friday afternoon Elizabeth called up Mrs. Hollister.
"Please, Mrs. Hollister, let Carol come and stay with me till Monday. I'm so lonesome, and mamma says she will be so glad if you will let her come."
"Oh, my dear, that would be impossible. Carol isn't suitably dressed to make a visit, you know," answered the mother quickly, glad that she had so good an excuse for keeping her child from this venture into an alien world about which she had many grave doubts.
But the young voice at the other end of the telephone was insistent.
"Dear Mrs. Hollister, please! She doesn't need any other clothes. I've got lots of things that would fit her. She loaned me her gingham dress to make garden in, and why shouldn't I loan her a dress to wear on Sunday? I've got plenty of clean middy blouses and skirts and can fix her all out fresh for school, too, Monday morning, and if you'll just let her stay Sidney will take us both down to her school when he goes to the office. You've got all those children there at home, and I've only myself. Sidney doesn't count, you know, for he's grown up."