“M-m-m,” mumbled Elizabeth Ann, taking a delicious bite. “My, you make good cookies, Lyn. We have to go home, you know. Uncle Doctor has to cure sick people and I have to go to school. Couldn’t you go and live with Cousin Nellie?”
“She asked me,” Lyn admitted, beginning to iron one of Elizabeth Ann’s dresses, “but I can’t go that far away from home. Maybe next year, when some of my sisters are older and can help my mother, I’ll be able to go.”
“Don’t you have to go to school?” asked Elizabeth Ann, biting her cookie all around the edge. She thought they lasted longer that way.
“No-o, I don’t,” Lyn said, “but I suppose I ought to. Your Cousin Nellie talked to me about school this summer. She says everyone ought to learn as much as they can.”
“My, yes,” agreed Elizabeth Ann seriously. “There is a great deal to learn. Maybe you never get through. My Aunt Ida who has a school—that’s where I went last winter with my cousin Doris—goes to school herself. She takes lectures during vacation and studies all the time.”
Lyn had never heard of a school teacher who still studied school books, and before she could think of anything to say, an old white horse came rambling up to the steps. This was Elizabeth Ann’s horse, Jaspar, and she had ridden him all summer.
“He wants sugar!” cried Elizabeth Ann. “Lex got some at the store—it’s under the car seat—please wait a minute, Jaspar, and I’ll be right back.”
She dashed away to the front of the house. The car was still standing where Lex had stopped it, though she didn’t see him there. Elizabeth Ann didn’t expect to see Lex—she knew that every spare moment he could get to himself he spent studying the books that were to help him enter college that fall.
Cousin Nellie was still there, though. She was sitting on the low front steps, reading her letters.
“Elizabeth Ann, I have a letter from your Aunt Jennie,” said Cousin Nellie (Elizabeth Ann really had a great many relatives, but she managed to keep them all straight in her mind).