“Let’s play dressing up,” she proposed, “and I bid to be Miss Grayson.”
Marjorie was willing and chose to be Mrs. Rice the professor’s wife who had at present the distinction of being the seminary bride. As a coachman was needed, little Tom Turner who sat on the curbstone longing for an invitation, was offered the position, and perched on a piano stool in front of a steamer chair he drove his spirited horses—two rocking chairs—with great skill.
Miss Grayson in an old silk gown of Aunt Charlotte’s swept into her carriage with astonishing dignity any number of times that morning, followed by Mrs. Rice in a flowered kimono.
When they grew tired of this play they went to the orchard, and there Caro decided that it would be quite easy to climb the wall if you didn’t mind the currant bushes.
“You’d better not,” cried Marjorie, shocked at such audacity, but when she was assured that it was just lovely up there, she could not resist and she and Tom followed.
It was an old-fashioned garden into which the children looked, already rather brown and bare except for a few chrysanthemums and asters, but still with a beauty of its own quite different from the smooth elegance of the grounds in front of the house.
They sat there full of delight over their adventure, craning their necks to see as far as possible into this unknown land, when there came the sound of footsteps on the fallen leaves.
Marjorie was down in an instant, and Tom after her, but Caro waited till an invalid’s chair appeared, rolled by a tall colored man. In the midst of the rugs and shawls a handsome, boyish face was to be seen, and Caro who had expected—she didn’t know what—was so surprised that instead of slipping down after Marjorie as she had intended she sat perfectly still.
“Stop just here Thompson, I must have that bit of view through the trees,” said the occupant of the chair, and Caro saw he had a camera.
She watched with interest till the right position was found and the picture taken.