For half an hour they compared and checked off items, and he found her accounts accurate to a penny.
"Father bought three geese and a gander from Ike Helm," she said. "They were rather expensive, but two were mated, and they call very well when tied out separated. Do you think it was too expensive?" she added timidly, showing him the bill.
"No," he said, smiling. "I think it's all right. Mated decoys are what we need, and you can wing-tip a dozen before you get one that will talk at the right time."
"That is true," she said eagerly. "We try our best to keep up the decoys and
have nothing but talkers. Our geese are nearly all right, and our ducks are good, but our swans are so vexing! They seem to be such fools, and they usually behave like silly cygnets. You will see to-morrow."
While she was speaking, her brother came quietly into the room with an open book in his hands, and Marche, glancing at it curiously, saw that it was a Latin grammar.
"Where do you go to school, Jim?" he asked.
"Father teaches me."
"'Well,' he said pleasantly, 'what comes next, Miss Herold?'"