"They're perfectly right, Mary. Oh, I'm ever so glad!"
"So they came to me, and asked me if I wouldn't be their Guardian. I didn't want to at first—and then I was afraid I wouldn't be any good. But I promised to talk to Mrs. Chester, and get her to suggest someone who would do, and—"
"You needn't tell me the rest," laughed Eleanor. "I know just what happened. Mrs. Chester just talked to you in that sweet, gentle way of hers, and the first thing you knew you felt about as small as a pint of peanuts, and as if refusing to do the work would be about as mean as stealing sheep. Now, didn't you?"
Mary laughed a little ruefully.
"You're just right! That's exactly how it happened," she said. "She told me that no one would be able to do as much with these girls as I could, and then, when she had me feeling properly ashamed of myself, she turned right around and began to make me see how much fun I would have out of it myself. So I talked to Miss Halsted, and made her go to see Mrs. Chester—and here we are!"
Suddenly Eleanor collapsed weakly against one of the empty packing boxes that littered the place, and began to laugh.
"Oh, my dear," she exclaimed, "if you only knew the awful things we were thinking about you before we knew who you were!"
"Why? Do you mean to say that you're snobbish, too, and didn't want neighbors you didn't know? Like my girls at Lake Dean?"
"No, but we thought you might be kidnappers, or murderers, or fire-bugs, like our last neighbors!"
"Eleanor! Are you crazy—and if you're not, what on earth are you talking about?"