Greenacre Girls. Forrester Izola Louise
shook his head with a little smile of doubt.
"But it would never be fair to take them away from this sort of thing, Roxy. You don't understand. They have their church and their club work and their special studies. Jean has been taking up a course in Applied Design and Modeling, and Helen has her music. Kit's deep in school work and belongs to about five clubs outside of that. Dorrie's about the only one disengaged, and she has a dancing class and the Ministering Children's League over at church. Betty's on more committees and things than I can count, and she believes that we owe it to the children to give them the best social environment that we can. Perhaps we can get along in some way. There's a little left at the bank."
"How much?" demanded Roxana uncompromisingly. "I mean, after you've paid up everything. I'll bet there isn't five thousand left."
"Five thousand! I doubt much whether there is one thousand. Don't tell Betty that. I have never bothered her about such things, and there are a few securities I might sell and realize on."
"And you think that you've been a good husband to her. Land alive, what are men made of! Here she stands a chance of being left alone in the world with four children to bring up and you've never bothered her about your business. The sooner you get to it, the better, I think." Roxana stood up and adjusted her eyeglasses resolutely. She had seen what he could not, Betty coming leisurely up the box-bordered walk, a loose cluster of yellow jonquils in her arms, and the girls following, all except Kit. "There they come now. I won't say anything till you do, Jerry."
Suddenly Kit's voice sounded at the door. Her short curls were rumpled and towsled, and her eyes wide with excitement, as she hugged a hot water bottle to her face.
"I've heard almost every word you said," she burst out. "I had neuralgia and stayed home this afternoon, and I've been asleep in there on the couch. Please don't be sorry, Dad. I'll help you every blessed bit I can, and I think it would be glorious for us all to go up into the country."
She stopped as the door below, in the front entrance hall, banged and Doris came upstairs on a run, a herald of love and joy.
"Well, child, keep your mouth shut till we know where we're at," counseled Roxy quickly. "Go back and lie down. Here they come."
But Kit stood her ground, and Jean and Helen seemed to catch from her the fact that there was something unusual in the wind as they came in behind their Mother.
"It was a lovely walk," said Mrs. Robbins, drawing off her gloves as she sat down beside the bed and smiled at the patient. "We went down to look at the Dunderdale place, Jerry. It is simply lovely there even in winter. You can see the summer possibilities. I never saw so many shrubs and trees and such beautiful grouping. It made me think of our Californian places."
"Or an Italian garden, Mother dear," Jean added eagerly. "Why, Dad, it's exactly like some of Parrish's pictures, don't you know; tall poplars over here, and then a hedge effect and a low Roman seat tucked in every once in a while. Why, it's just as cheap as can be."
"You'd enjoy the garden so this summer, and there are enclosed sleeping porches, and an inner court like a patio garden. The garage is small, but it will do if we don't get a new car this year."
Right here Cousin Roxana sniffed, a real, unmistakable sniff. She was a believer in quick action. If you had anything to do, the quicker you did it and got over it the better, she always said. So now she raised her head as they all looked at her, and sprang her bolt right out of a clear sky.
"You won't get a new car this year, Betty, my dear, and you're not going to move into any two-thousand-five-hundred-dollars-a-year bungalow, either. I'm going to take the whole lot of you to Gilead Center, and see if Jerry can't get his health back up in those blessed hills of rest."
CHAPTER IV
THE QUEEN'S PRIVY COUNCIL
There was a queer silence, fraught with suspense for each person in the room. Mrs. Robbins looked down at the wearied face lying back on the white pillows with a startled expression in her usually calm eyes. Instinctively both her hands reached for his and held them fast, while Jean laid her own two down on her mother's shoulders as if she would have given her strength for this new ordeal.
"You mean for a little visit, don't you, Cousin Roxy?" she asked eagerly.
"No, I don't, Jeanie. I mean for good and all, or at least until your father has time to get well, and that can't be done in a few days."
"But Doctor Roswell says he's gaining every day," Mrs. Robbins said. She waited for some reassuring answer, her eyes almost begging for one, but Cousin Roxana was not to be dismayed.
"Jerry, tell what the doctor said to us this morning. Not that I take much stock in him, but he may be on the right track."
"Nothing special, Motherbird and robins all," smiled back Mr. Robbins; "only it appears that I am to be laid up in the dry dock for repairs for a long while, and the sinews of war won't stand the vacation expenses if we stay where we are now."
"I wouldn't try to talk about it, dear, before the children," began Mrs. Robbins, quick to avoid anything that savored of trouble or anxiety. "We must not worry. There will be some way out of it."
"There is," Cousin Roxy went on serenely. "If ever the finger of Providence pointed the way, it's doing it now. I say you'd better move right out of this kind of a place where expenses are high and you can't afford anything at all. This is a real crisis, Elizabeth Ann." She spoke with more decision as she saw Jean pat her mother comfortingly. "It has got to be met with common sense. When the bread winner can't work and there's a nestful of youngsters to bring up and feed and clothe, it's time to sit up and take notice, and count all of your resources."
"How would it do for you to take Father up home with you for a rest, Cousin Roxy?" Jean suggested, stepping into the awkward breach as she always did. "Then we could let Annie and Rozika go, and just keep Tekla to do the cooking and washing. And when he came back we'd have all the moving over, and it would be the prettiest time of the year along in late August."
Mrs. Robbins' face brightened at the suggestion.
"Or we might even renew the lease here, Jerry. The house is very pleasant after all, and we could get along with it if it were all done over this spring."
Mr. Robbins looked up at Cousin Roxana's countenance with whimsical helplessness, and she answered the appeal.
"Now, look here," she said with decision and finality. "You'd better put the idea of staying here right out of your mind, Betty. The winds of circumstance have blown your nest all to smithereens, and if you're the right sort of a motherbird, you'll start right in building a fresh one where it's safer. I think your way lies over the hills to Gilead Center. You can pay all your bills here, sell off a lot of heavy furniture, and move up there this spring. For you can't stay here. There's hardly enough money to see you through as it is. I'm going to help you along a bit until you get your new start."
"Not money enough," said Mrs. Robbins as though she could not comprehend such an idea. "But we couldn't think of going up there and all living with you, Cousin Roxy."
"You're not going to," answered Roxana. "Thank the Lord, I live in a land where houses and food are cheap and there's room for everybody. We don't tack a brass door-plate on a rock pile like I saw there in New York, Betty, and call it a residence at about ten dollars a minute to breathe. I've been telling Jerry you'd better rent a farm near me, and settle down on it."
"But Roxy-" Mrs. Robbins hesitated.
"Oh, Mother, do it, do it," came in a quick outburst from Kit, standing back against the wall. "It would be perfectly dandy for all of us and would do Dad a world of good!"
"We wouldn't mind a bit. We'd love it, wouldn't we, Dorrie?" Helen squeezed Doris's hand to be sure she would answer in the affirmative. "We'd all help you."
Doris was silent, still too bewildered at the outlook to express an opinion.
"I shouldn't mind for myself, but we must think of the girls-their schooling and what environment means at their age. I suppose Jean could be left at school."
"Thought she was all through school," came from Cousin Roxana.
"I