“The very thing!” exclaimed Migwan. “I’ll plant climbing nasturtiums and train them to go up the pole and wind around the basin, so it will look like a fountain.”
“Four heads are better than one,” observed Nyoda, as the seeds were planted, “when they are all looking in the same direction.”
Just then a young man came up the path from the road. “May I use your telephone?” he asked, courteously raising his hat. He spoke with a slight foreign accent.
“Certainly you may,” said Migwan, going with him into the house. She could not help hearing what he said. He called up a number in town and when he had his connection, said, “This is Larue talking. We are going to do it on the Centerville Road. There is a river near.” That was all. He rang off, thanked Migwan politely and walked off down the road. The incident was forgotten for a time.
That afternoon Gladys was coming home in the automobile. At the turn in the road just before you came to Onoway House there was a car stalled. The driver, a young and pretty woman, was apparently in great perplexity what to do. “Can I help you?” asked Gladys, stopping her machine.
“I don’t know what’s the matter,” said the young woman, “but I can’t get the car started. I’m afraid I’ll have to be towed to a garage. Do you know of anyone around here who has a team of horses?”
Gladys looked at the starting apparatus of the other car, but it was a different make from hers and she knew nothing about it. “Would you like to have me tow you to our barn?” she asked. “There is a man up the road who fixes automobiles for a great many people who drive through here and I could get him to come over.”
The young woman appeared much relieved. “If you would be so kind it would be a great favor,” she said, “for I am in haste to-day.”
Gladys towed the car to the barn at Onoway House and phoned for the car tinker. The young woman, who introduced herself as Miss Mortimer, was a very pleasant person indeed, and quite won the hearts of the girls. She was delighted with Onoway House, both with the name and the house itself, and asked to be shown all over it, from garret to cellar. “How near that tree is to the window!” she said, as she looked out of the attic window into the branches of the big Balm of Gilead tree that grew beside the house, close to Migwan and Hinpoha’s bedroom. It was much higher than the house and its branches drooped down on the roof. “How do you ever move about up here with all this furniture?” asked Miss Mortimer.
“Oh,” answered Migwan, “we never come up here.”