“I am not a boy, thank my lucky stars and all the saints,” objected Emma. “I’ll have you understand that, sir.”
“Let the dove of peace rest over your touchy spirit, Emma,” laughed Grace chidingly.
“It isn’t a dove. It’s a crow,” corrected Chunky. “A thousand pardons, Emma dear. I—”
“I’m not your dear,” answered Emma with considerable heat.
“Yes, you are, but you don’t know it. To realize it you will have to emerge from the unconscious state in which you now so sweetly repose,” teased Stacy, amid the laughter of the others.
“I should prefer to be unconscious all the time,” flung back Emma.
“Ah! The food does smell good. Food always has a strange effect on me, and really, I haven’t smelled any in almost a thousand years—not since breakfast this morning. By the way, where do we go and when do we start?”
“To the Sierras,” answered Tom Gray. “How are you, Chunky?” he added, extending a hand.
“Starved. How’s yourself?”
“I think after we go back to the dining room and after I have my dessert that I shall feel fit as a fiddle,” replied Tom. “To answer the rest of your question, we expect to start tomorrow forenoon. The ponies will be shipped in a car that is now on the siding at Oakdale.”