"Oh, isn't it lovely!" exclaimed Madaline, "and everything is so clear after smoky Pennsylvania."
"Yes, Bellaire is beautiful," Cleo replied, with a show of pride that her relation should be the benefactor. "I know we'll have a wonderful time. Aunt Audrey is like a girl herself, and she knows what girls enjoy."
"Oh, her husband is the author, isn't he?" Grace remembered. "We'll have a chance to see how he writes all his funny books."
"'Fraid not," said Cleo, "Uncle Guy is away. We are going to have everything to ourselves but his study. You can be sure that's all locked up. But look! See that queer woman dressed like a gypsy! See her going along by the hedge! What—do you suppose she is looking for?"
"Early dandelions, perhaps," ventured Mrs. Harris, who had overheard the question as she stopped in her luggage directions to Collins.
"But she isn't like a gypsy either," Cleo insisted. "Look at the lace head dress!"
"And the girl with her," interposed Grace. "My, but she's dressed queer, too. Looks like something from the stage or movies."
The old woman and child had now come up to the big gateway, where the touring car was parked awaiting the exit of another motor that happened to be standing in the Dunbar driveway. As the strange little girl gazed at the tourists she dropped something—a book—and the woman with her, evidently a caretaker, shook her violently at the trivial accident.
"Oh!" exclaimed Grace. "How rough, just for dropping a book!"
"But look! how that girl stares!" whispered Madaline. "As if she couldn't get her eyes off us."