"Declare you were jealous," finished Dorothy. "We will hope she was in earnest with her graciousness—perhaps she is always that way—antagonistic with strangers."
"Never," and Tavia went into a mud puddle in her attempt to speak very decidedly. "There! I'm glad that was not my canvas shoe. I was tempted to wear them. Ouch! Wet through! But I was about to say that Viola is not mean to all strangers. Did you see the way she went for Nat?"
"Well, we must not make trouble by going out of our way to meet it," preached Dorothy. "Viola may not have a chance to bother us at Glenwood, even if she cared to try."
"Chance! You can depend upon her to make all the chance she wants. But I have my defense all mapped out. I am certain she will try to disgrace us with the patrol story."
"What disgrace could she make out of that?" asked Dorothy in surprise.
"Don't know, haven't the least idea, only I fancy she will fix something up. But I'll give her 'a run for her money,' as the boys say," and Tavia displayed something of the defense she had "mapped out" in a decidedly vindictive attitude. Packing of trunks and doing up of girls' belongings made the time fly, so that when the morning of the actual departure did arrive both girls felt as if something important must have been overlooked, there was so much hurry and flurry. But the train puffed off at last, with Dorothy Dale and Octavia Travers passengers for the little place called Glenwood, situated away off in the New England mountains.
Major Dale felt lonely indeed when his Little Captain had kissed the two boys—her soldiers—good-bye, and, when she pressed her warm cheek to his own anxious face, it did seem as if a great big slice of sunshine had suddenly darted under a heavy black cloud. But it was best she should go, he reflected, and they must get along without her.
Tavia's folks were conscious of similar sentiments. The squire, her father, and her little brother Johnnie went to the station to see the girls off, and Johnnie felt so badly that he actually refused to go fishing with Joe Dale, an opportunity he would have "jumped at" under any other circumstances. Roger Dale had rubbed his pretty eyes almost sightless trying not to cry and listening to Aunt Libby's oft-told story that had never yet failed to heal a wound of the baby's heart, but he surely did not want Doro to go, and he surely would cry every single night when she did not come to kiss him.
"I just do want her," he blubbered on the newly-ironed gingham apron that Aunt Libby buried his sweet face in, "and I don't love Auntie Winnie for taking her away."
So the Dalton home was left behind.