"I didn't get very far, I am afraid," said Gail modestly. "Just a peep into the rooms upstairs and a beginning down here when I found Gussie almost on the verge of tears because her dessert had burned black and she had no time to make any more; so I—"
"Bet our talking burned up her pies," Peace was heard to murmur remorsefully.
"—helped her out a little," continued Gail, "and by that time the bell rang, so there was no opportunity for any further investigations."
"Saint Elizabeth," said the President reverently, while the white-haired mistress of the house beamed her approval.
"Now, Faith,—but there is really no need of asking her about her discoveries. She got no further than the parlor with its piano. Now, did you?"
"No, grandpa," Faith confessed unblushingly. "I saw it when we came in, and I simply couldn't resist it a minute longer than was absolutely necessary. There will be lots of days for getting acquainted here, and besides, I knew Peace would carry off the prize—"
"Me carry off the prize!" Peace interrupted. "I've never got a prize for anything in my life—"
"Only because there never was one offered before for the person who could see the most or talk the longest," laughed Faith, and Peace subsided suddenly.
"Saint Cecilia,—she could not get past the piano," teased Dr. Campbell, when the shout of laughter at Faith's sally had died away. "Hope, what have you to say for yourself?"
"Not much. I visited all the rooms upstairs and down; fed the canary; got acquainted with Blinks, the cat, and Kyte, the hound; found Towzer and tried to make him be friends with Kyte, but he wouldn't be coaxed. Gussie said there were some kittens in the basement, so I went down there to find them, but the boy from the hardware store was there working on the furnace, and some way we fell to talking about studies, and he was so discouraged over his algebra lesson for night-school that I stopped to see if I could help him out a little, and the bell rang Just as we got the third problem worked."