"We've had a visitor," said the girl, confidentially; "a lady who has taken the Bigbee house for the summer." Bub nodded, still whittling. "I know; I seen her drive her car up the grade on high," he remarked, feeling the edge of his knife-blade reflectively. "Seems like a real sport--fer a gal--don't she?" "She isn't a girl; she's a grown woman." "To me," said Bub, "ev'rything in skirts is gals. The older they gits, the more ornery, to my mind. Never seen a gal yit what's wuth havin' 'round." "Some day," said Irene with a smile, "you may change your mind about girls." "An' ag'in," said Bub, "I mayn't. Dad says he were soft in the head when he took up with marm, an' Talbot owned a wife once what tried ter pizen him; so he giv 'er the shake an' come here to live in peace; but Dad's so used to scoldin's thet he can't sleep sound in the open any more onless he lays down beside the brook where it's noisiest. Then it reminds him o' marm an' he feels like he's to home. Gals think they got the men scared, an' sometimes they guess right. Even Miss' Morrison makes Will toe the mark, an' Miss' Morrison ain't no slouch, fer a gal." This somewhat voluble screed was delivered slowly, interspersed with periods of aimless whittling, and when Irene had patiently heard it through she decided it wise to change the subject. "To-morrow we are going to ride in Miss Lord's automobile," she remarked. Bub grunted. "She says she can easily run it up to our door. Do you believe that!" "Why not?" he inquired. "Don't Will Morrison have a car? It's over there in the shed now." "Could it be used?" quietly asked Mary Louise, who had now strolled up behind the bench unperceived. Bub turned a scowling face to her, but she was looking out across the bluff. And she had broached a subject in which the boy was intensely interested. "Thet thar car in there is a reg'lar hummer," he asserted, waving the knife in one hand and the stick in the other by way of emphasis. "Tain't