"I couldn't stand it," said Rosemary earnestly to a chipmunk, who shook his head in sympathy. "I couldn't stand it, if Sarah and Shirley and I had to go live in different houses. Suppose we didn't have Mother and Hugh and Winnie!"
The realization of her own blessings only emphasized the hard position of the Gays without a father or mother. By the time she had come to the Rainbow Hill orchard, Rosemary was feeling very blue indeed.
"Come on up!" two sweet little voices called to her. "Come on up, Rosemary!"
Rosemary peered at the trees, and giggles floating from one gnarled old apple tree revealed where Sarah and Shirley were hidden.
"What's the matter?" asked Shirley instantly, when Rosemary had swung herself up to a seat beside them.
"I've been to see Louisa Gay," explained Rosemary, "and they haven't a cent of money for the interest on that awful mortgage. It's due the first of September and Louisa says the man will take the farm and they'll all be on the town!"
"I thought you had to go and live in the poor house, if folks took your farm," objected Sarah.
"It's all the same," said Rosemary impatiently. "Louisa says so. When you're 'on the town' that means the town supports you and you live at the poor farm. Girls, we just have to get some money for the Gays!"
"Ask Hugh," suggested Shirley, as her favorite way out of money difficulties.
"We can't," Rosemary told her. "Louisa and Alec don't like strangers and Hugh is a stranger to them. We mustn't even tell grown-up people about them, because if they know the Gays are poor, they'll come and take them to the poor farm, anyway. Alec says they don't even go to the Center any more because he doesn't want people to ask him questions."