Yes, Ma Petterby ran, too, in spite of the fact that she was no longer young and that her old joints were crippled with rheumatism.
She received the girls with literally opened arms and seemed so genuinely overjoyed to see them that Dorothy was glad she had yielded to Lance’s suggestion.
The little house was as homelike inside as out, and the girls were shown through it all by the proud Sue, who had herself brightened and enriched the unpretentious rooms with pretty needlework and bright cretonnes.
They came back at last to the living room and Octavia Susan, rescued from a perilous position in her crib, was placed, cooing and gurgling, in the delighted Tavia’s arms.
Ma Petterby regaled them with all the gossip of the countryside. Then, when questioned concerning Ophelia, the hen, she told the story of the little hen’s entry into farmyard society with so much dry humor that the girls were thrown into gales of merriment.
It was Dorothy who finally suggested that they should be on their way back to the Hardin ranch.
Lance, who had disappeared to give the “women folks a chance to git real well acquainted,” was nowhere to be found when the girls were ready to go, and both Ma Petterby and Sue urged the girls to “set and wait” till Lance got back.
But Dorothy, driven always by her anxiety concerning Joe, felt that she could not wait any longer. Garry would almost surely be back by this time and she must get to him at the first possible moment!
Neither of the girls was the least afraid to go back alone. The trail, though narrow, was clearly marked and they knew that it would be very easy to return the way they had come.
“But it isn’t safe for two young girls to wander around these woods alone,” Ma Petterby protested. “Lance would be terrible put out if he was to think I’d permit it. He’ll most likely be back before you get around that curve yonder.”