Doris shook her head.
“Some day there won’t be any,” she said, firmly. “Don’t you know what it says in the Bible about, ‘the lion shall lie down with the lamb and there shall be no more bloodshed’?”
Shad looked at her with twinkling eyes as he drawled in his slow, Yankee fashion,
“Couldn’t we even kill a chicken?”
And Doris, who specially liked wishbones, subsided. Over the telephone Cousin Roxy cheered them all up, first telling them the road committeeman, Mr. Tucker Hicks, was working his way down with helpers, and would get the mailman through even if he was a couple of hours late.
“You folks have a nice hot cup of coffee ready for the men when they come along, and I’ll do the same up here, to hearten them up a bit. I’ll be down later on; a week from Monday is Lincoln’s birthday, and I thought we’d better have a little celebration in the town hall. It’s high time we stirred Gilead up a bit. I never could see what good it was dozing like a lot of Rip van Winkles over the fires until the first bluebird woke you up. I want you girls to all help me out with the programme, so brush up your wits.”
“Isn’t that splendid?” exclaimed Kit, radiantly. “Cousin Roxy is really a brick, girls. She must have known we were ready to nip each other’s heads off up here just from lack of occupation.”
Piney joined in the general laugh, and sat by the table, eyeing the four girls rather wistfully.
“You don’t half appreciate the fun of being a large family,” she said. “Just think if you were the only girl, and the only boy was way out in Saskatoon.”
Jean glanced up, a little slow tinge of color rising in her cheeks. She had not thought of Saskatoon or of Honey and Ralph for a long while.