"It'd be acting a lie," broke in Nancy.

"Oh, not exactly, Nancy, for you really are Anne Leavitt and, anyway, it's just as though you were my other half. Way back I know we are related. If you don't love me well enough to help me out now--well, I'm disappointed. I'll never forget it!"

Poor Nancy, mindful of the long separation that lay before her and her friend, cried out in protest.

"Oh, Anne, _don't_ say that!"

Claire, her eyes brilliant with excitement, chimed in:

"Nancy, it's a hope-to-die adventure. Maybe you could make up no end of stories and plays out of the things that happen up there! And, anyway, you can finish the 'Child' and come to Merrycliffe that much sooner!"

Claire had advanced the most appealing argument. North Hero Island certainly sounded more inspiring than a stuffy flat in Harlem with six small Finnegans one floor below. And it was an adventure. Anne hastened to take advantage of the yielding she saw in Nancy's face.

"You can stay here with me until I have to go to New York, and we can look up trains and I can tell you all about my forefathers, though I really don't know a single thing. But she won't expect you to know--don't you remember she wrote that she regretted my being brought up without knowing the home of my forefathers. And if you just act as though you wanted more than anything else in the world to learn all about the Leavitts, she'll just love it and she'll tell you everything you _have_ to know!"

"It's the most _thrilling_ romance," sighed Claire, enviously.

"Sounds more to _me_ like a conspiracy, and can't they put people in jail for doing things like that?" demanded Nancy.

"Oh, Nancy, you're _so_ literal--as if she would, way up there on an island next to nowhere! And anyway, think of the boys who perjured themselves to get into the service. Wasn't that justified?"

Nancy, being in an unpleasant mood, started to ask what _that_ had to do with _her_ pretending to be an Anne Leavitt who she wasn't, when Big Anne went on in a hurt tone:

"Well, we won't talk about it any more! I'll have to give up going to Russia and my whole life will be spoiled. And I _am_ disappointed--I thought our friendship meant something to you, Nancy."

"_Anne_! There isn't a _thing_ I wouldn't do for you! You're next dearest to Dad. For you I'll go to--Freedom or any old place. I'll do my best to be you to the dot and I'll pay homage to your forefathers and will ask not a penny of the legacy--if you get it! It shall all be for the cause!"

Anne read no irony in her tone. Her dignity flown, she caught her friend in a strangling hug. "Oh, Nancy, you _darling_, will you? I'll never forget it! We'll write to her right away--or you will. From this _very_ minute you are Anne Leavitt!"

"I wish I could go, too," put in Claire. "Perhaps I can coax Barry to motor up that way."

"Don't you _dare_!" cried Nancy in consternation. "It would spoil it all. I'll write to you every day every thing that happens. Goodness, if I'm as scared when I face your Aunt Sa-something as I am right now when I think about it, she'll know at a glance that I'm just an everyday Leavitt and not the child of her forefathers!"

"Hark!" Claire lifted a silencing finger. "The seniors are singing."

The lines they loved drifted to them.

"Lift the chorus, speed it onward, Loud her praises tell!"

"Let's join them." Suddenly Claire caught a hand of each. "_Girls_, think of it--what it _means_--it's the last time--_it's all over_!"

Her pretty face was tragic.

Big Anne, with a vision of Russia in her heart, set her lips resolutely.

"Don't look _back_--look _ahead_!" she cried, grandly.

But in Nancy's mind as, her arms linked with her chums', she hurried off to join the other Seniors in their last sing, the troubling question echoed: "To what?"

CHAPTER II

WEBB

A clatter of departing hoofs, a swirl of dust--and Nancy was left alone on the hot railroad platform of North Hero. Her heart had seemed to fix itself in one painful lump in her throat. She was so very, very close to facing her adventure!

"If you please, can you tell me in what way I can reach Freedom?" Her faltering voice halted the telegraph operator as he was about to turn the corner of the station.

"Freedom? Well, now, old Webb had ought 'a been here for the train.

Isn't often Webb misses seein' the engine come in! Just you go in and sit down, Miss, he'll come along," and scarcely had the encouraging words pa.s.sed the man's lips than a rickety, three-seated, canopied-topped wagon, marked "Freedom Stage" turned the corner.

"_Hey_, Webb, here's a lady pa.s.senger goin' along with you to Freedom!

And did you think the express would wait fer you?"

Webb and his dusty, rusty and rickety wagon was a welcome sight to poor Nancy. It had already seemed to her that her journey was endless and that Freedom must be in the farthest corner of the world. For the first few hours she had been absorbed by her grief at parting with Anne. But a night in a funny little hotel in Burlington had given her time to reflect upon her undertaking and it had a.s.sumed terrible proportions in her eyes. The courage and confidence she had felt with her chums, back in the room in the dormitory, deserted her now.

"Goin' to Freedom you say, Miss?" the man Webb asked, a great curiosity in his eyes. "Wal, you jes' come along with me! Had an order for Tobiases and it set me late, but we'll git thar. Climb up here, Miss,"

and with a flourishing aside of his reins he made room for her on the dusty seat he occupied.

Nancy handed him her big bag and climbed easily over the wheel into the seat he had indicated. Then with a loud "get-ap" and a flourish of his whip they rumbled off on the last leg of Nancy's journey.

"Ain't ever been to Freedom before?" he asked as they turned the corner of the maple-shaded street of the little town, and the horses settled down into a steady trot. "Reckon not or old Webb 'ud have known ye--ain't any folks come and go on this here island thet _I_ don't know," he added with pride, dropping his reins for a better study of his pa.s.senger.

The air was fragrant with spring odors, the great trees met in a quivery archway overhead, the meadow lands they pa.s.sed were richly green; Nancy's failing spirits began to soar! She threw a little smile toward the old man.

"I've never been in Freedom before--though I'm a Leavitt," she ventured.

Her words had the desired effect. The man straightened with interest.

"Wal, bless me, are ye one o' Miss Sabriny's folks? And a-goin' to Happy House when ye ain't ever seen it?"

Nancy nodded. "I'm Anne Leavitt," she answered carefully. "And I have never seen my Aunt Sabrina. So I have come up from college for a little visit. And I think _everything_ is lovely," she finished, drawing a long breath, "though, goodness knows, I thought I'd never get here!"

She was uncomfortably conscious that the old man was regarding her with open concern.

"Funny, no one ain't heard a word about it! So ye're Miss Sabriny's great-niece and a-comin' to Happy House from your school fer a visit!"

"Why, yes, why not?"

"Wal, I was jes' thinkin' you'd never _seen_ Happy House. And I guess most folks in Freedom's forgotten Miss Sabriny hed any folks much--count of the trouble!"

"Oh, _what_ trouble, please, Mr. Webb?"

The old man shook his reins vigorously against the horses' backs.

"Webb, you're an old fool--an old, dodderin' fool! Of course this here trouble was a long spell ago, Miss, and don't belong to Leavitts young like you. I s'pose it want much, anyways, and I guess Miss Sabriny herself's forgotten it else you wouldn't be a comin' to Happy House!

I'm an old man, missy, and thar ain't been much in Freedom as I don't know about, but an old un'd ought 'a know 'nough to keep his tongue in his head. Only--you come to Webb if anything bothers you and you needn't call me _Mr_. Webb, either, for though I'm one of Freedom's leadin' cit-zuns and they'd never be a Memorial Day or any kind of Fourth of July doin's in Freedom without _me_--n.o.body calls me Mister Webb and you jus' come to me----"