"Father, what are we to do for horses to go nutting with?" spoke up Horace. "Robin raked this part of town yesterday with a fine-tooth comb, and couldn't find anything but an old clothes' horse, and that was past travelling."

"My son!"

Mr. Clifford's face said very plainly,--

"Not so flippant, my child!"

But the only remark he made was to the effect that there were doubtless horses to be found in the city at the stables.

"What about the infant, mamma?" said Grace. "Is she to be one of the party?"

When Katie was present she was sometimes mysteriously mentioned as "the infant." It was quite an undertaking to allow her to go; but Mrs.

Clifford had yielded the point an hour or two before, out of regard to Horace's feelings. She knew the nutting party would be spoiled for him if his beloved little Topknot were left out.

"Is I goin'?" asked she, when she heard the joyful news. "Yes, I'm _are_ goin' to get some horse."

"No, some pecans, you little Brown-brimmer."

Katie had a dim suspicion that she owed this pleasure to her brother's influence.

"Hollis," said she, eagerly,--"Hollis, you may have the red part o' my apple."

This sounded like the very fulness of generosity, but was a hollow mockery; for by the "red part" she only meant the skin.

Mr. Clifford had one horse, and while Robin Sherwood was going to the city for another, Mrs. Clifford made ready the lunch.

Happy Dotty walked about, twirling a lock of her front hair, and watched Katinka cleaning the already nice paint, spilling here and there "little drops of water, little grains of sand." She also observed the solemn yet dextrous manner in which Phebe washed the breakfast dishes, and looked on with peculiar interest as Aunt Maria filled the basket.

First there were custards to be baked in little cups and freckled with nutmeg, to please Uncle Edward. Then there was a quant.i.ty of eggs to be boiled hard. As Mrs. Clifford dropped these one by one into a kettle of water, Katie ran to the back door, and cried out to the noisy hens,--

"Stop cacklerin', chickie; we've got 'em."

Then, fearing she had not made herself understood, she added,--

"We've found your _aigs_, chickie; they was ror, but we's goin' to bake 'em."

Dotty was impressed with the beauty of the picnic basket and the delicacy of the food. Everything she saw was rose-colored to-day.

"O, Aunt 'Ria, I should think you'd like to live out West! Such splendid fruit cake!"

"I saw Fibby and my mamma make that," said Flyaway, "out o' cindamon and little clovers."

"Clovers in cake?"

"Not red and white clovers; them little bitter kinds you know," added the child, with a wry face.

There were four for each carriage. Dotty rode with her father, Mrs.

Clifford, and Katie. Little Flyaway looked at the hired phaeton with contempt.

"It hasn't any cap on, like my papa's," said she; but she was prevailed upon to ride in it because her mamma did.

Horace went with his father and the "cup and saucer," as he called Grace and Ca.s.sy. He was in a state of irritation because his idolized Topknot was in the other carriage.

"You can't separate that cup and saucer," growled he to himself.

"They'll sit and talk privacy, I suppose; and I might have had Brown-brimmer if it hadn't been for Ca.s.sy."

CHAPTER VIII.

GOING NUTTING.

As they drove along "the plank road," farther and farther away from the city, Dotty saw more clearly than ever the wide difference between Indiana and Maine.

"Why, papa," said she, "did you ever breathe such a dust? It seems like snuff."

"It makes us almost as invisible as the 'tarn cap' we read of in German fairy tales," said Mrs. Clifford, tucking her brown veil under her chin.

She and Mr. Parlin both encouraged Dotty to talk; for they liked to hear her exclamations of wonder at things which to them seemed common-place enough.

"What did you call this road, Aunt 'Ria? Didn't you say it was made of boards? I don't see any boards."

"The planks were put down so long ago, Dotty, that they are overlaid with earth."

"But what did they put them down for?"

"You musser ask so many kestions, Dotty," said Flyaway, severely; "you say 'what' too many times."

"The planks were laid down, Dotty, on account of the depth of the mud."

"Mud, Aunt 'Ria?"

"Yes, dear, dusty as it is now, at some seasons of the year the roads are so muddy that you might lose off your overshoes if it were not for the large beams which bridge over the crossings."

"That reminds me," said Mr. Parlin, "of the man who was seen sinking in the mud, and, when some one offered to help him out, he replied, cheerfully, 'O, I shall get through; I have a horse under me.'"

"Why, was the horse 'way down out of sight, papa?"

"Where was the hossy, Uncle Eddard?"

"It was only a story, children. If the man said there was a horse under him, it was a figure of speech, which we call hyperbole; he only meant to state in a funny way that the mud was excessively deep."

"Is it right to tell hyperblees, papa? Because Jennie Vance tells them a great deal. I didn't know the name of them before."

"No, Alice, it is not right to tell untrue things expecting to be believed--of course not."