The woodchuck bake in the grove behind the old school house, which Dorothy and Tavia used to attend, was pronounced

a success by the three youngsters. Of course, there were not many invited guests, for aside from three woodchucks

and a half bushel of sweet potatoes, there were but half a dozen squirrels baked in the ashes of a huge campfire.

These were not sufficient to supply a regiment, as Tavia herself said—and Tavia was a generous body.

Besides the two girl friends and the three small boys, there were the four freshmen, three of whom had frankly come

down here to Dalton for this spring vacation just because Dorothy and Tavia were here.

These individuals could not really be counted as guests—any of them. So Tom Moran was really the only guest at the

bake. He had recovered Dorothy’s hat and jacket and other possessions from the Daggetts and their friends, and233

when he brought them to Tavia’s, Dorothy and her chum made Tom come along with them to the picnic.

Ned White had gone to Mr. Rouse, the farmer, and paid for the burned fodder stack.

“Eight dollars, young gentlemen,” said Ned, rather grimly, to Joe and Roger Dale and Tavia’s brother. Rather a

high price to pay per pound for woodchuck meat; and Nat figured it out to cost something like sixty or seventy cents

per pound.

“Oh! don’t talk about it that way, Nat,” begged Joe. “It will taste so of money that none of us kids will want

to eat it.”

They all got pretty well acquainted with Tom Moran that day. And he really was a fine young fellow. Although his

book learning might not be extensive, he had traveled much and was one of those fortunate persons who remember, and

can talk of, what they have seen.

Tom Moran was going back with the girls the next day, for the vacation was close upon its end. At first he was not

decided what he should do after getting little Celia from Mrs. Hogan. But Tavia and Dorothy fixed that.

“Tom,” said Mr. Travers, when the party returned from the woodchuck bake, “I’ve been talking with my partners

and we want you to settle down here in Dalton and work for us.”

“I don’t know, Mr. Travers,” said the young234 man, undecidedly. “You see, I had some words with Simpson——”

“Oh, you won’t be under Simpson—and we won’t put a mechanic like you to driving an ox-team, either. There is a

better job than that here for you,” and Mr. Travers talked seriously with the red-haired youth for an hour.

“The trouble with you is, you have never settled down. You haven’t had an anchor. Now, Celia can’t travel about

with you, and she’s got to be your care for some years to come.”

“I know. If I can get her away from that Hogan woman. I may have trouble there—if the foundling asylum folk let

Mrs. Hogan adopt her.”

“If you want help in that matter, you trust to Major Dale, Dorothy’s father. He’ll see you through, Tom. And so

will your friends here in Dalton. We want you to come back here and go to work.”

Thus it was arranged. Tom, the next day, appeared at the railroad station in a neat suit and with a new grip in his

hand. The grip was practically empty, he told Dorothy; but he proposed to get it filled up with nice clothes for

Celia if he could get the child away from her taskmistress at once.

The White boys and Abe Perriton and Bob Niles traveled back to college in the Firebird, so235 Dorothy and Tavia said

good-bye to them before they left Dalton. Bob Niles tried to get Tavia off by herself to talk on the last evening

they were together; but Tavia was suddenly very strict with him.

“You are nothing but a college freshman,” she told him, coolly, “and a very fresh freshman at that! Don’t you

think for a minute that you are a grown-up young man—you are not. And I am only three months, or so, older than I

was when we parted in New York. It’s going to be a long, long time before either Doro or I will begin to think

seriously of young men. Besides—you’re not a twin,” she added, and ran away from him, leaving poor Bob greatly

puzzled by her final phrase.

They were going back to Glenwood a day early, because of Tom’s anxiety. When the train reached the school station

only Tavia got off; Dorothy went on to Belding with Celia’s brother.

At the station they hired a carriage and an hour later drove into the lane leading to Mrs. Hogan’s home.

It was the first real spring day. The grass “was getting green by the minute,” so Tom said; the trees were budding

bountifully; every little rill and stream was full and dancing to its own melody over the pebbles; the early

feathered comers, from236 swamp and woodland, were splitting their throats in song.

And when the two drove into the yard there were sounds of altercation from the house—the first harsh sounds they

had heard since starting from Belding.

“And that’s the way ye ............