"I reckon you two would like to have a little talk, and the girls are waiting for me." She sped back to the house, and soon forgot her indignation in the joy of the We are Sevens' reunion.

"It seems too good to be true!" she exclaimed, gazing happily from one girl to another, as the seven of them lounged about the living-room, three on the broad couch and the rest distributed impartially between the floor and the window-seat. Such complete informality had never seemed permissible in the sedate Clyde mansion; but somehow these surroundings seemed to invite one to be as comfortable and unconventional as possible.

Suddenly Blue Bonnet's eyes danced. "Doesn't this remind you of my first tea-party?" she asked demurely.

"Well, I should say not!" Kitty exclaimed. "We all sat around your grandmother's drawing-room with manners as stiff as our dresses, waiting for our hostess--"

"And wondering what you would be like--" added Sarah.

"Were you prepared to see the wild Indian I proved to be?"

"Fishing!" sang Kitty.

Susy looked from Blue Bonnet to Kitty and laughed. "My, this sounds like old times!"

"Stop talking about old times, please," begged Ruth, "and tell us about the new ones. I want to be told all about the round-up, and I want to see the 'vast herds' and the cowboys,--and the blue bonnets!"

Blue Bonnet's laugh rang out. "Blue bonnets in August! Come in March and I'll show you a sea of them,--and a round-up, too. The cattle and the cowboys you shall see to-morrow,--and some steer-roping that will make your hair stand on end."

Ruth ran her hand through her boyish, close-cut locks and made them stand literally on end. "It isn't much of a trick to do that!" she said with a grimace.

"Never mind, maybe it will come in curly," said Sarah the comforter.

"You can trust Sarah not to see the thorns for the roses," said Blue Bonnet, sending the comforter an approving glance.

"What turtle doves you all are," laughed Susy.

"Oh, it's Sarah and Blue Bonnet who do all the cooing. The rest of us are still just geese." Kitty's voice had a tinge of envy that did not escape the notice of the rest.

"Go play us something, Blue Bonnet," suggested Ruth tactfully, "--that cowboy piece we all like."

"Invalids must be humored," remarked Blue Bonnet as she went to the piano.

In a minute the little rollicking air that she had played at her first tea-party, had set them all to dancing and humming as on that historic occasion.

"Aren't Kitty and Blue Bonnet as chummy as they used to be?" Ruth asked Amanda under cover of the music.

"Yes, by spells. They had one tiff--the second since they've known each other,--and ever since we've lived in dread of the third, haven't we, Sarah?"

"You have," Sarah returned. "And I have too, in fact, though I try not to be superst.i.tious. Besides they've had the third--and it's all over now."

"They have? When?" Amanda sat up in surprise.

"While we were camping. Kitty told me about it and said it was all her fault. The last one wasn't, you know. First it's one and then the other that's to blame."

"Kitty and Blue Bonnet aren't going to stop at three tiffs, you may depend on it," Ruth said wisely. "They're going to have three times three and then some. Because Kitty is Kitty, and Blue Bonnet is--Blue Bonnet!"

As the gay music ceased Grandmother Clyde looked in at the door. "It is time for the travellers to rest. They must be fresh for the great occasion to-morrow," she said, nodding to Susy and Ruth.

Blue Bonnet glanced over to the couch where Ruth reclined among the pillows. Her face, with its crown of short dark hair, looked very thin and white.

"I reckon the girls had better go to your room, Grandmother,--it's about the only place where they can be quiet. Benita is putting two cots in the nursery, but it's never quiet in there till we're all asleep."

Ruth rose regretfully, "I'll go rest if I must. But I hate to miss anything that's going on. If you only knew how deadly dull it has been in Woodford! I think the inhabitants have learned to appreciate the We are Sevens, for the place has seemed empty without them. And everybody wants to know when the Texas Blue Bonnet is coming back."

They all looked towards Blue Bonnet. "I--why--there's Uncle Cliff looking for me," she said, and left the room precipitately.

"Blue Bonnet's usual way of avoiding an answer," thought Kitty.

"When does the Fall term of school begin?" asked Sarah.

"The tenth of September,--and that means we must leave here about the third," said Susy. "Only two weeks of this for us, girls!"

"We'll see that they are two busy weeks," Kitty promised.

Blue Bonnet drew Uncle Cliff into a secluded spot on the side veranda.

"You just saved my life, Uncle Cliff."

"Were you being talked to death, Honey?"

"No,--but I just escaped a pitfall. People do ask the most--uncomfortable questions."

"Suppose you tell me what sort?"

"Well, Ruth says people want to know when the Texas Blue Bonnet is going back to Woodford."

"So that's come up again, eh?" Uncle Cliff knitted his brow. "I reckon you're doing some thinking along that line, Blue Bonnet?" He watched her face anxiously.

She nodded. "Yes, I--you see there isn't much time left. I must decide soon. It's not going to be easy, Uncle Cliff."

"No,--not for either of us, Honey."

"And there's Grandmother, too,--and Aunt Lucinda. Other people seem to have a lot to say about one's life, don't they?"

"They have a lot to say, Blue Bonnet, but the person who has the final 'say' is yourself. You're old enough now to decide what you want to do with your life. Sixteen to-morrow!"

"I know what I want to do with my life, Uncle, but I don't know yet just how to do it."

"Don't you think you could manage to do it on the ranch? We know now where to get a first-cla.s.s tutor, and--"

"Oh, as far as 'book-learnin''--as Uncle Joe calls it,--goes, I reckon I could get that all right, here on the ranch with a tutor. But books, I've found out, aren't more than half of an education. You know, life's mighty simple on the ranch, and I've grown used to doing things the easiest way. But that isn't the big way. Aunt Lucinda says every woman should have a vocation."

Uncle Cliff squirmed. Blue Bonnet seemed to have a.s.similated a rather big dose of Aunt Lucinda. "But, Honey," he protested, "a girl with plenty of money doesn't need a vocation."

"Oh, she didn't mean that kind of a vocation. It's a sort of glorified way of doing your duty by your neighbor. And you know it isn't very easy to do your duty by your neighbor when the nearest neighbor is miles away! Now, Aunt Lucinda is the most all-round useful person.

She's helping to keep up a home for cripples in Boston, and is secretary of the Church Aid Society, runs Grandmother's house and--"

"Everybody in it!" added Uncle Cliff.