"Does Keineth know how we spend the Fourth of July?" Billy asked one evening.
"I hate firecrackers!" Keineth shuddered. "We always went away over the Fourth to a little place out on Long Island."
"We just have balloons and Roman candles in the evening because they are not dangerous," Peggy explained.
"And then on the Fourth we always make our visit to Grandma Sparks."
"Who is she?" asked Keineth. She had never heard them speak of Grandma Sparks.
"Father calls her a page out of history."
"Every man that had ever lived in her family has served his country--"
"She isn't really our grandmother. Just a dear friend."
Barbara explained further: "She has the most interesting little old home about two miles from here. Part of it is over one hundred years old! She lives there all alone. And her house is filled with the most wonderful furniture--queer chairs and great big beds with posts that go to the ceiling and one has to step on little stepladders to get into them, only no one ever does because she lives there all alone. She has some plates that Lafayette ate from and a cup that George Washington drank out of--"
"And the funniest toys--a doll that belonged to her grandmother and is made of wood and painted, with a queer silk dress, all ruffles! She always lets me play with it."