"Do it? Why, we'll all wait for Dick Lee."
Mrs. Myers took a little too much for granted; and when the hour came for starting, there came a slight disturbance in the smooth current of her calculations.
"Mr. Foster," she called out, in her best voice, from half way up the stairs, "the first bell is ringing. Are you and your friends ready?"
"Ringing?" responded Ford. "So it is! I regret to say we are not yet ready to go."
At the same moment Dab was whispering,—
"We mustn't start until it's nearly done tolling."
"What's that?" asked Frank.
"Don't you know? It's always so in the country. First they ring the bell, as it's ringing now. That's to set people a-going. Then they toll it. You'll hear in a few minutes. That means, the time's up."
Ford Foster's city training had not taught him as much as that, but he was glad to know it.
Mrs. Myers once more urged upon them the necessity of making haste.