"Well, ma'am? exclaimed Miss Peckham, don't see as it's any more of your business than 'tis mine. I'm makin' this gruel—"

"And I will finish preparing the dinner, if you do not mind, Miss Peckham," said the soft voice Mrs. Carringford. "I see that Janice has it almost ready. Do you think, Miss Peckham, that a man with a broken leg needs gruel?"

"Well, I couldn't find nothing to make broth out of—"

"Or broth?" pursued Mrs. Carringford. "I know Mr. Day's appetite, and I do not believe that broken leg

has made it any the less hearty."

"Seems to me you know a good deal!" snapped Miss Peckham. "Specially about this kitchen."

"You know, I have been working here for some time," Mrs. Carringford said. "Thank you, Miss Peckham. You need not stay. If there is anything we need you for, I will let you know. Good-night."

The spinster banged out at the kitchen door without even coming into the front part of the house.

"Not even to 'wash her hands of us' again!" giggled Janice, who ran out into the kitchen with a cry of joy.

"Oh, Mrs. Carringford!" she said, throwing her arms about the woman's neck, "have you really come to stay?"

"I guess I shall have to, my dear. Daytimes, anyway," said Amy's mother, kissing her. "You'd soon go to rack and ruin here with the neighbors coming in and littering everything up. Yes, tell your father I will accept the offer he made me. And now, we'll have dinner just as soon as possible. How is he?"

"He says he is all right," gasped Janice, catching her breath. "And he says there is always a silver lining to the very blackest cloud. Now I know he's right. You are the silver lining to this cloud, Mrs. Carringford—you really, truly are!"



CHAPTER XXIV. "WHERE THERE'S SMOKE THERE'S FIRE."

If it had not been for Mrs. Carringford's presence in the house, this experience certainly would have been a very hard one for Janice Day. For although the trials of housekeeping had been serious for the young girl, they were not all that had so vexed her and weighted her mind with sorrow.

But her father's injury shocked her out of the mental rut which she had been following. She had to wait on him, hand and foot; and it gave her so many new thoughts and new things to do, that for a time at least Janice Day's old troubles were pretty much sloughed away.

They had managed to make Mr. Day comfortable on the living-room couch, and it was easier to care for him there than it would have been were he in his bedroom. Besides, he very much objected to "being invalided to the upper story" while he was tied down with a broken leg.

Mr. Arlo Weeks came in night and morning to help turn the injured man, and remake his bed. Mr. Weeks was, after all, a good neighbor; he was more helpful than anybody else who came to the Day house, save Mrs. Carringford.

The surgeon came now and then to restrap the broken leg. Some of Mr. Day's business associates called to see how he was getting on. The injured man was not hard to take care of. He could read, propped up on the couch, and although he suffered considerable pain he did not allow Janice to discover that he was uncomfortable.

But at first he did net sleep well at night, and he had some fever. Mrs. Carringford was careful in his diet; and she never seemed to contradict him or to thwart his wishes. She had a way with her that Janice could but admire and pattern after.

The girl saw that even daddy was not quite his very sensible self when he was an invalid. He had to be humored at times; and they did all that was possible to keep him from fretting.

Broxton Day had been a very active man. Business affairs of which he had sole charge were bound to go wrong when he could not wield power as he was wont. And these things all bothered him when the nagging pain of the broken leg increased, as it sometimes did, at night.

"Oh, what should I have done without you, Mrs. Carringford?" breathed Janice, often taking comfort in the kindly woman's arms for a momentary hug. I do think Amy and Gummy and the little ones are awfully nice not to make any more objection than they do to your being up here."

"Oh, they quarrel enough with me about it at times," laughed Mrs. Carringford. "But I tell them if it was not here, it would have to be somewhere else. I have got to work, my dear. I can see that plainly. Every day the appetites of my little family increase and their needs grow. The rate at which Kate and Edna May and Syd wear out shoes— Well!"

"Let them go barefooted," giggled Janice. "I know they are teasing you all the time about it"

"No!" cried Mrs. Carringford, with warmth. "I know we live in Mullen Lane and it is not always possible for me to dress my children as nicely as I wish; but they shall not run barefoot like the little hoodlums that live about us. And Syd bothers me to death about it."

But Janice could only laugh a bit at this. She herself sometimes ran barefooted around the house and yard, though she was growing too big for that now, and she did not blame the little Carringfords for wanting to do so.

At any rate, she was very, very grateful to Mrs. Carringford for stepping into the breach at this time and helping them—and grateful to Amy and Gummy, as well.

Amy was a smart little housewife, and she had a gentle but firm way with the smaller children that kept them well in hand when their mother was out of the way.

Gummy, driving Mr. Harriman's delivery wagon, was at the Day house once or twice a day to see his mother, and of course Mrs. Carringford was always at home by seven or eight o'clock at night. The Days had set forward their dinner hour while Mr. Day was held in the house.

Janice would not sleep upstairs herself at first, while her father so often needed her. She made up a bed on another couch that was drawn in from the dining room, and slept there. Often in the night daddy grew restless and was thankful for a glass of fresh water or for some other small comfort.

There was one night Janice knew she should never forget, no matter to what age she lived. It was soon after her father was brought home "an invalid," as he laughingly called it. He had been in much pain all day, and Janice new it well enough, although he smothered his groans when she was within hearing.

But he could not smother his mutterings at night. Toward dark he grew feverish and very restless. And when one has a "glass leg," as the ambulance man had called it and cannot twist and toss to relieve that restless feeling, one's situation is, indeed, pitiful.

Janice put out the living-room light early. The light only made the night flying insects buzz and blunder at the window screens. And how is it that moth millers will get into the most closely screened house? This was a vexing mystery to Janice.

After it was dark and the insects went to buzz elsewhere daddy dropped to sleep. Janice had been upstairs to remove her clothing, and had come down again with a thin negligee over her nightgown.

She listened to her father's uneven breathing and to his restless murmurs. Before creeping into her own cot across the room, she went softly to daddy's side and knelt on the floor. His face was flushed and his thick hair wet with perspiration. The barber had not been to shave him for two days, and Janice just knew the "prickles" on his face must feed very uncomfortable.

His head rolled from side to side upon the pillow. She wished she could do something to relieve him. She did not want to wake him up; but if she could only lave his face and hands with cool water—

Suddenly his mutterings became intelligible. Janice was held there on her knees—absorbed and almost breathless.

"Laura!"

The name was uttered so passionately—so reverently —that Janice found the tears spring unbidden to her eyes. Daddy had spoken her dead mother's name in his sleep. Indeed, it seemed as though he called to the loved one who had gone from them never to return.

"Laura!"

"Daddy!" breathed the girl. "It's me, not mamma! I— I'm all that's left to you!"

He seemed, even in his sleep, to have heard Janice's murmured words.

"All that was left to me," Broxton Day sighed, repeating, as Janice thought, what she had said. Or did he repeat Janice's words? "Your dear thoughts— and gone! gone! If I could only find them again. The box—Olga." His mutterings trailed off into unrecognizable delirium. He muttered, and his inflamed face moved from side to side upon the pillow. He did not know her at all this heartsick, sobbing little daughter!

For Janice could understand at last what went on in his poor, troubled brain. He was dreaming of the packet of letters—the letters that were so precious to Broxton Day. In the secret compartment of the lost treasure-box. In the fever of the man's brain nothing else seemed so important to him as his lost wife's letters!

Of course, all of Janice Day's school friends did not go away from Greensboro for the summer vacation; or, if they did go away for a little visit, they were soon back again.

And when the girls heard that Janice's father had broken his leg and that Janice was tied to the house with him, they began to come to see her, and inquire about daddy, and cheer her up.

None of them realized that, with Mrs. Carringford at the head of housekeeping affairs, Janice had not felt so free and cheerful for some months as she did at this time.

Daddy soon grew better, and he began to sleep peacefully at night. The surgeon, Dr. Bowles, who came occasionally, said the bones were knitting all right. Mr. Weeks and Janice even got the patient up into a wheel chair which had an arrangement that made it possible for the broken leg to rest stiffly before daddy, and he could wheel himself out on the front

porch.

There was just the one thing to trouble the girl; that was the mystery of the lost treasure-box and the secret sorrow she felt because she had been careless with it. Without her carelessness, she told herself, Olga Cedarstrom would never have taken it out of the house —if that was really how the keepsakes had come to disappear.

It was Bertha Warring who chanced, when she first came to see Janice after her return from an exciting trip to Chicago, to mention that girl, Olga. At least she spoke of the "Olga" who had been at the Latham house and had broken Mrs. Lantham's glass dish the night of Stella's party.

"I meant to speak to you about what Stella said, Bertha remarked, "before I went away. But we went in such a hurry. You know, Stella can be awfully mean."

"Why, she's not always nice," admitted Janice whose opinion of the farmer's daughter had changed a good deal during the past few months.

"I must say you let Stella down easy when you say that," laughed Bertha.

"Oh, she gets mad, and says mean things. But I don't think—"

"Now, stop it, Janice Day!" exclaimed the other girl "You know very wall that Stella is just as mean as a girl can be. See how she spoke of Amy Carringford. And Amy is an awfully nice girl."

"Yes, Amy is nice," admitted Janice, happily.

"Well, now, look here," said Bertha, earnestly. "Stella said something you did not hear once about that Swedish girl."

"Oh, I guess I am not particularly interested in that girl," Janice said slowly. "My father asked the Johnsons about her. You know that girl was staying with them at the time of the party. She ran away, I guess, because she was afraid Mrs. Latham would make trouble about the broken dish. But the Johnsons said her name was not Cedarstrom."

"Mercy, what a name!" laughed Bertha. "Just the same, there is something about that girl that Stella knows, and that she said you would give a good deal to know."

"Why, I can't imagine—"

"That's just it," said Bertha, quickly. "It sounded so mysterious. I ought to have told you about it there and then. But you know how jumbled up everything was, just the last days of school."

"That is so," admitted the puzzled Janice.

"But, you know, Stella and I went away on the same train together."

"No! Did you?"

"Yes. She changed cars before we got to Chicago; but she sat in the chair car with me for a long way. And I pumped her about what she meant when she spoke the way she did regarding that Swede."

"Yes?"

"Why, she giggled, and made fun, and wouldn't say anything much at first. But I hammered at her," said Bertha, "until I got her mad. You know Stella loses her temper and then—well, it's all off!" and Bertha laughed gaily.

"Oh, Bert!" admonished Janice warmly, "I don't think we ought to get her mad."

"Oh, she'll get glad again," said Bertha carelessly. "Don't worry about Stella, Miss Fussbudget."

Janice laughed then, herself. She did not mind Bertha Warring's sharp tongue.

"Well, as I was saying, I got her finally to say something more about that Olga. And what do you suppose she did say?"

"I could not guess," said the wondering Janice.

"Why, that it was very true her name was not Cedarstrom now. That is just the way she said it before she got up and flounced out of the car." "Oh, Bert!" gasped Janice.

"Do you see? I was some minutes catching on to it," Bertha said, rather slangily. "But you see, I guess. That girl had been known as 'Olga Cedarstrom' at some time or other, you mark my word. And Stella found it out and would not tell you."

"Then she must be married. Of course her name is not Cedarstrom now," murmured Janice.

"Oh! Is that it? I didn't know but she was a real crook," said Bertha, "and had what they call an 'alias.'"

"No-o, I don't believe so. The last daddy learned about her over at Pickletown, some of the Swedish people there thought she must have gone off to get married. She was going with a young man who works in one of the pickle factories. His name is Willie Sangreen."

"And what's become of him?" asked the interested Bertha.

"He went away, too."

"They ran off and got married! Of course!" cried the romance-loving Bertha. "And that Stella Latham found it out and wouldn't tell you. Maybe your father— Oh! but he can't go looking for them now that he has a broken leg, can he?"

"I am afraid not. We'll have to wait. But do you really suppose, Bert, that Stella is sure of what she says? Perhaps she doesn't really know for sure about that Olga."

"Where there's so much smoke there must be some fire," Bertha said, with a laugh, as Janice walked out to the front gate with her. "I guess Stella knows— Oh, Janice! Talking about smoke," cried Bertha suddenly, looking back at the Day house and up at the roof, "what is all that smoke coming out of your kitchen chimney?"

Her startled friend looked in the direction indicated. Out of the chimney-mouth, and between the bricks, poured a vomit of black smoke. Then, as the girls looked, red flames darted out with the smoke— spouting four or five feet into the air above the top of the chimney.



CHAPTER XXV. ABEL STROUT AT THE ROOT OF IT

The shock of seeing the chimney on fire did not overcome Janice Day as much as the thought that daddy was lying down, resting, in the living room, and that she would never be able to get him up and into his wheelchair and out of doors before the whole house was in a blaze.

For those lurid flames darting out of the chimney looked very terrifying indeed. Bertha Warring ran out into the street, screaming; but Janice darted back into the house.

Somebody outside screamed. "Fire! Fire!" Janice believed it must have been Miss Peckham. Little ever got past the sharp eyes of that neighbor in the next cottage.

Janice heard her father ejaculate some exclamation, but she did not go to him first. She rushed, instead, to the telephone in the hall.

Seizing the receiver, she rattled the hook up and down, hoping to get a quick response.

"Janice!" she heard her father call.

"Yes, Daddy. I'm coming!" she cried. Then her ear came the leisurely question:

"Number, please?"

"Central! give me the Fire Department—please!" ejaculated the excited girl.

"Number, please?" again drawled the unruffled Central.

"Oh, quick! Quick!" cried Janice into the instrument. "Give me the Fire Department. Our house is on fire!"

"Great heavens!" ejaculated her father from the living room. He was awake and heard Janice now.

"Do be quick, Central!" cried Janice. "The Fire De—"

"Market, two, three hundred," said Central.

"It's a wonder," thought Janice, even in her present state of mind, "that she doesn't call 'Information'!"

"Janice! Where is the fire?" called her father.

"It's the chimney. Wait, Daddy! I'll come and help yon. The kitchen chim— Oh!"

Somebody on the wire just then said crisply: "Central Fire Station. What's wanted?"

"Fire!" shouted Janice. "Our house! Eight-forty-five Knight Street!"

"I hear you!" exclaimed the man at the other end, and Janice almost threw the receiver back on the hook, and darted into the living room.

Mrs. Carringford happened to be out. Janice, now that Bertha Warring had deserted her, was all alone in the house with the injured man.

"Oh, Daddy!" she gasped, seeing him already in his chair.

"Give me a push, child. Where is the fire? This is something new—the first time the Days were ever burned out."

"It's the kitchen chimney. But I can't get you down the front steps—"

Meanwhile she was pushing him out on the porch. People were running toward the house now and many were shouting. But it did not look like a very helpful crowd.

Just then Janice saw a wagon being driven rather wildly along the street toward the house. It was not a part of the Fire Department equipment, although she looked eagerly for that. The nearest fire station was fully half a mile from the Day house.

The children in the street scattered as the horse's pounding feet on the macadam warned them of his approach. The driver stood up, his feet braced against the dashboard, yelling to the horse to stop as he swung back on the reins.

It was Gummy!

"Hi, Janice! Your chimneys on fire!" he shouted, when he had stopped the horse.

"Well, for goodness sake!" exclaimed Janice, "doesn't he suppose we know it, with all this crowd—and noise —and everything?"

Gummy tumbled out of the covered wagon. He came down on all fours, he was in such a hurry; but he was up again in a moment.

"Hi, Janice! I can put it out, if I can get out on to that ell roof through that little window up there." he cried.

"That's the hired' girl's room," gasped Janice.

"What's he going to do? Take pails of water out there and throw them down the chimney?"

"Give the boy a chance," said daddy. "Maybe he can do something." And to Janice's amazement, her father was smiling.

Gummy ran around to the back of the wagon. He dropped the tailboard, backed around, and got a bag on his shoulders. With this he staggered toward the house.

"Oh, Gummy!" screamed Janice, "what have you got in that sack?"

"Salt," replied the boy, panting up the steps. "Half a shushal of balt. I was takin' it out to Jones's.

"Salt?" gasped Janice, in her excitement not noticing at all that Gummy had again "gummed up his speech," to quote his own expression. "Why, what good is salt? That chimney is blazing."

"Salt will do the trick. Show me the way to that window. Salt will put out a fire in a chimney better than anything else."

"Let him have his way, Janice," said her father quickly.

She thought she heard the gong of some of the fire apparatus approaching; but she was not sure. She gave Gummy a hand, and they ran upstairs with the sack of salt between them.

Here was the small room. She flung open the door and Gummy flung up the lower sash of the window. He almost dived out upon the tinned roof of the kitchen ell.

"Quick! Give me that salt I" he cried reaching in for it.

Janice helped him lift the bag out of the window. He dragged it along the roof toward the chimney that now vomited black smoke and flames in a very threatening volume. Fortunately the light wind drifted it away from the main part of the house.

"Oh, Gummy, you'll be burned to death—and then what will your mother say?" cried Janice.

Gummy was so much in earnest that he did not even laugh at this. He dragged the sack of salt as close to the burning chimney as he dared. Then he got out his pocketknife and cut the string.

Everybody in the street below was yelling to him by this time, telling him what to do and how to do it. Gummy gave them little attention.

The smoke choked him and occasionally a tongue of flame seemed to reach for him. But Gummy Carringford possessed a good deal of pluck, and he was strong and wary for so young a boy. Shielding his face as best he could from the heat and smoke, he began to cast double handfuls of salt into the chimney.

The chimney was fortunately not as high as his head and Gummy could do this as well as a man. The soot which had gathered in the chimney (perhaps it had not been cleaned out since the house was built) was mostly at the bottom, and the flames came from down there; but the hot bricks would soon set the roof on fire, if not the walls inside the house.

The salt smothered the fire wherever it landed. It was better than sand for such a purpose, for salt is damp and seems to possess smothering qualities all its own when rained upon the flames.

Before half the contents of the bag had been thrown down the chimney the flames no longer leaped above its top. The smoke continued to roll up, and Gummy had pretty well smothered it himself when the Fire Department apparatus came clanging up to the house.

One of the fireman with a portable extinguisher rushed upstairs, got out at the small window and reached Gummy's side quickly.

"Good boy, kid," he said. "Let's give it the lad," and he began to squirt the contents of the fire extinguisher down the chimney.

Gummy staggered back and sat down, coughing. His face and hands were pretty black and he was breathless. When he got back downstairs and the firemen had declared the conflagration entirely extinguished, Gummy found himself quite a hero.

The excitement had hurt nobody, after all. Janice was glad Mrs. Carringford was not there at the time, or she certainly would have been worried about Gummy.

"You are an awfully smart boy, Gummy," Janice declared, clinging to the boy's hand. "I won't ever make fun of you again when you get mixed up in talking."

Mr. Day overheard this and laughed heartily. He too, shook Gummy cordially by the hand.

"You have a head on you, son," he said. "How came you to think about the salt?"

"I saw a chimney on fire in the country once, and they put it out with salt," the boy replied. "I've got to hurry back to the store and get more salt for the Jones's now. I guess Mr. Harriman will be mad."

"Oh, no he won't. I'll call him up on the telephone and tell him to put this sack on my account. He won't scold you, I am sure," said Mr. Day.

In fact, everybody who heard about the matter praised Gummy Carringford. They began to say "that boy with the funny name is considerable of a boy," and things like that. Mr. Day gave him a little money, although Gummy did not want to take that.

"You treat your little brothers and sisters with it, Janice's father said laughing. "They didn't have the fun of seeing you put out the fire."

"We-ell," said the thoughtful boy, "I'll see what Momsy says about it first."

When Mrs. Carringford returned to the house Mr. Day himself told her of the fire and of what Gummy had done, and how proud she should be of him, too. And Mrs. Carringford was proud—Mr. Day could see that.

"Boys are awfully nice to have around the house, aren't they, Daddy?" Janice said that evening as they sat alone. "I never did think before that I'd care to have a brother. You see, you are just like a brother to me, Daddy."

"I see," said Daddy, chuckling. "When it comes to chimney fires and such excitement, a boy comes in handy, is that it?"

"Why—ye-es, Berta Warring ran away, crying, and I couldn't do much but squeal myself," said Janice gravely.

"And telephone for the Fire Department, and help me out, and aid Gummy to carry up the salt, and—"

"Oh, but, Daddy, those are all such little things!" sighed Janice.

Janice thought things were going pretty well after that. They were so glad to have their house saved from destruction, and so proud of Gummy, that everybody seemed all right. But there was trouble coming, and one afternoon Amy brought it to the Day house.

Amy, in tears, came to see her mother. Janice chanced to be in the kitchen when she entered from the Love Street gate. Amy had in tow a curly-haired dapper little man who looked too oily to be honest, and with little gimlet eyes that seemed to bore right through one.

"Oh, Mother!" gasped Amy, "this—this man's come to take our house away from us!"

"What is this now?" exclaimed Mrs. Carringford, in as much surprise as fear.

"Yes, he has. He said so. He's got papers, and all," sobbed Amy.

"Ahem! the young lady puts it very crassly indeed," said the curly-haired man. "You, I presume, are Mrs. Josephine Carringford," he went on, reading from a paper.

"Yes."

"I am serving you in the suit of Mrs. Alice G. Blayne, of Croydon, Michigan, my client, to recover a certain parcel of property situated on Mullen Lane and now occupied by you and your family, Mrs. Carringford," said the man glibly, and thrusting a paper into the woman's hand.

"But I bought my home through Mr. Abel Strout, of Napsburg," gasped Mrs. Carringford. She did not recognize Jamison, the farm hand, in the transaction at all. She now felt that man was but Abel Strout's tool.

"Oh! As to that, I have nothing to say," said the curly-haired lawyer, smiling in a way Janice did not like at all. "I merely represent my client. The property has been claimed by several people, I believe, and may have been sold a dozen times. That will not invalidate my client's claim."

"But I never even heard of this Mrs, Blayne," murmured Amy's mother.

"A poor widow, ma'am," said the lawyer blandly. "And one who can ill afford to lose her rights. She as heir of old Peter Warburton Blayne who lived in that house where you now reside for a great many years. He died. His heirs were not informed. The place was sold for taxes—for a nominal sum, ma'am. Of course, a tax-deed has no standing in court if the real owner of the property comes forward ready to pay the back taxes, accrued interest, and the fixed court charges."

"But I got a warranty deed!" cried Mrs. Carringford.

"That is a matter between you and the person you say you bought the house of," said the lawyer calmly. "If you consider that you have a case against him you will have to go to court with him. Ahem! An expensive matter, my dear madam, I assure you. Probably the man who sold to you had every reason to believe he had a clear title. It has passed through several hands since Peter Blayne died, as I say.

"I cannot advise you as to that, ma'am," pursued the lawyer. "Those papers are in regard to this suit that is already entered against you. Of course, it would be cheaper for you to settle the case out of court; but you will probably want to fight us. Most women do."

At this point Janice got to her feet and ran out of the room. She rushed in to where her father was writing on a lapboard across the arms of his chair.

Meanwhile Mrs. Carringford and Amy were clinging together and facing the dapper, voluble, little lawyer in the kitchen. Amy was sobbing excitedly; but her mother said firmly:

"Abel Strout is at the root of this—"

"I assure you," said the lawyer politely, "my client is Mrs. Blayne. I have nothing to do with Abel Strout."

"He is at the root of it, nevertheless," said Mrs. Carringford confidently. "I saw it in his eye when he was last in my house. He means to turn me and my children out, and ruin us!"



CHAPTER XXVI. THE CLOUDS LOWER

Janice was so excited she could scarcely speak intelligibly for a minute. But finally she made her father understand what was going on in the kitchen.

"And he's come to take their house right away from them," concluded the girl. "He's given her a paper, and she's got to give him the house—and everything!"

"Oh, no; not so bad as all that," said daddy, soothingly. "Things aren't done in just that way— not even by shyster lawyers. This is just a notice of suit he has given her. But you run, Janice, and tell them to come in here. I will hear what this man has to say."

So Janice ran back to the kitchen. She held the door open, and, with rather a commanding air for so young a girl, looking straight at the curly-haired man:

"You and Mrs. Carringford come into the living room. My father wants to see you."

"Hey?" said the man. "Who is this?"

"Mr. Broxton Day," said Mrs. Carringford, quietly. "I think we had better see Mr. Day before we go any farther in this matter."

"Oh, I have no interest in seeing anybody else, ma'am," said the lawyer hastily. "Of course, you can take advice if you wish to. Every move you make, however, will cost you money, as you'll find. It will be throwing good money after bad money, I assure you."

"Now if you feel like settling the matter out of court—"

"We will go in, and you can say all that before Mr. Day," said Mrs. Carringford firmly. "It seems to me I shall understand it better in front of him."

"Daddy is waiting for you," said Janice urgently. "He has a broken leg so he can't come here to get you," she added looking at the lawyer significantly.

Maybe the fact of this assurance—that Broxton Day was practically helpless physically—led the lawyer to take a chance in the living room. But he was manifestly very ill at ease from the moment he heard Mr. Day's name mentioned.

"Will you oblige me with your name, sir?" said daddy in his ever-courteous way.

The curly-haired man fumbled for a card and finally handed one to Mr. Day.

"'Mr. Jonas Schrimpe,'" repeated daddy. "Are you practising at the bar here in Greensboro?" "My office is in Napsburg, Mr. Day. Three Forty-two Main Street."

"Ah! Are you acquainted with Mr. Abel Strout?"

"I have nothing to do with Mr. Strout," said the man, rather sharply. "I have already told the lady that. My client is Mrs. Blayne—"

"I understand," said Mr. Day suavely. "I merely asked you a question, Mr. Schrimpe. Do you know Mr. Strout?"

"Well—I know him by sight."

"Naturally. As I chance to remember his office is in the same building on Main Street as your own. I remember the number," said Mr. Day smiling. "Three Hundred and Forty-two Main Street."

Mr. Schrimpe fidgeted and turned very red in the face. Mr. Day went on quietly:

"Is this client of yours in Napsburg?"

"She lives in Croydon, Michigan."

"In Michigan! How came she to pick out you Mr. Schrimpe, for an attorney in this matter? Forgive the question; I am curious."

"Why—I—I was recommended to her."

"Ah! By a friend, I suppose."

"She—she heard of me down here, and wanted to put the case in a lawyer's hands on the spot."

"'On the spot,'" repeated Mr. Day. "Why not in some lawyer's hands in Greensboro, rather than Napsburg?"

Mr. Schrimpe seemed very confused, as well as angry; but he did not dare to assert himself. Mr. Day held out his hand for the paper the lawyer had given to Mrs. Carringford.

"Just leave it to me, Mrs. Carringford," he said confidently. "I know just what to do. Possibly had I not broken my leg I would have been able to warn you of this."

"Then that Abel Strout is at the root of it, just as I said," she cried.

"Not a doubt of it," replied Mr. Day. "That John Jamison was but a dummy."

"I assure you," began the red-faced lawyer, but Mr. Day interrupted:

"Your assurances would not be accepted before this court, I am afraid, Mr.—ah Schrimpe. Now would you mind, as you are in town, calling upon Mrs. Carringford's legal adviser in regard to this affair?"

I—oh—"

"Oh, Mr. Day!" interjected Mrs. Carringford, "a lawyer's services cost so much."

"This man is my own lawyer," said Mr. Day promptly. "I assure you that he will look into this suit without charging you much, Mrs. Carringford. If Mr. Schrimpe—"

"Oh, if it's not out of my way as I go back to the railroad station," growled the curly haired man.

"Not at all. It is over the bank—the Farmers and Merchants Bank. Mr. Randolph E. Payne is the gentleman." "Great Scott!" gasped Mr. Schrimpe, actually appearing to shrivel, "Mr. Payne?"

"Yes. He is known to you?"

"Everybody knows Mr. Payne."

"He is well known. As good a lawyer, I believe, as we have in this part of the State. You do not mind meeting him?"

"Er—will he see me, Mr. Day?"

"I will telephone to him at once. I assure you he will give you a hearing—and thank you. Good day, Mr. Schrimpe."

Although daddy could not leave his chair, Janice saw that he had a way of getting rid of visitors promptly when he wanted them to go. Mr. Schrimpe scuttled out in a hurry.

"Wheel me to the telephone, Janice," said Mr. Day cheerfully. "I hope Payne frightens that little shrimp out of a year's growth. If ever I saw a shyster lawyer, I saw one when that fellow came into the room."

"Oh, Mr. Day! but this suit? That summons? What shall I do?"

"Do nothing yet! assure you, Mrs. Carringford, you will have one of the best lawyers in the State to tell you what to do when the times comes. Of course, if the matter comes to court, you will have to go into court and meet them. But don't worry till that time comes. That is my advice."

"Then they can't take our home away from us?" cried Amy joyfully."

"Hold on!" advised Daddy. "I do not say that. I don't wish to encourage you with any false hopes—nor to discourage you, either. I know nothing—absolutely nothing—regarding the legal status of this case. I have my suspicions that Abel Strout is behind it."

"Oh, I am sure of that!" cried Mrs. Carringford.

"Nevertheless, it may be that there is an unsatisfied claimant of the old Peter Warburton Blayne property. This Mrs. Alice G. Blayne may be perfectly honest in her contention."

"But in that case won't Mr. Strout or Mr. Jamison give me my money back?" asked Mrs. Carringford.

"If there was much chance of that, do you think Strout would have stirred up any such suit as this?" asked Mr. Day quietly. "No. Strout at least thinks he sees his way to making you lose the house. Jamison was his dummy—used by him in order to keep, himself out of trouble."

"Oh, Mr. Day! Don't say that"

"I say he thinks he has a chance. But he may be mistaken. Strout is sly. This may be merely 'strike suit' started in the hope of scaring you into making a disastrous settlement with him. He wants to get the property back. The foundations for that factory are already being laid. Property values Mullen Lane are going up."

"Oh, dear me!" sighed Mrs. Carringford, starting back toward the kitchen, "this is a wicked world."

"Nothing the matter with the world," said Mr. Day, cheerfully. "It's some of the folks in it."

He called Mr. Randolph E. Payne's office then and talked to the successful lawyer for some time. To Janice, afterward, he would say nothing more encouraging than he had said to the widow.

"When one mixes up with a sharper like Abel Strout, one is likely to be burned before he is through. Strout is always and forever trying little, nasty, legal tricks. And Schrimpe is an instrument fitted to Strout's hand.

"Perhaps they have found some ignorant woman who really was a relative of Peter Blayne, and who may have a small claim on the property. It is enough to invalidate the deed Mrs. Carringford has and yet she will be unable to prove that Strout and his man Jamison knew about the fault in the title.

"If he makes her sue to recover the thousand dollars she paid the legal fees will eat up that sum—and he can afford to hire lawyers and dribble along through the courts better than she can."

"Oh, Daddy!"

"Yes, I am afraid, if Strout—or, rather, Schrimpe— has a good case it will be better to settle it out of court."

"But, dear Daddy! Mrs. Carringford has no money to pay lawyer's fees, or settle cases," urged Janice.

"True. And that is the unfortunate part of it. Let us wait and see what Mr. Payne advises after he has looked into the matter. Whatever he says, she would better do."

This ended the matter for the time being. But all the dark clouds of trouble seemed to have lowered upon the Carringfords again. Janice Day was sorry for them, but this was a case in which she positively could not "do something" to help. She could only offer her sympathy.



CHAPTER XXVII . INFORMATION THAT IS TOO LATE

During the days immediately succeeding the fire and the Carringford's poignant trouble, Janice Day had a mental problem to solve which occupied her thoughts a good part of the time.

Daddy's broken leg was getting along nicely. With the aid of crutches he could get around very well indeed. He had even gone down to the bank in an automobile.

So Janice did not have to give him quite the close care and attention that she previously had. Daddy declared she was making a mollycoddle of him, anyway—that she babied him too much.

She had more freedom of action, therefore, and now she proceeded to put a certain plan she had made into effect. Janice had not forgotten what Bertha Warring had said regarding the information Stella Latham had hidden from her, Janice, at the time school closed.

Could it be that, after all was said and done, the Olga who had broken Mrs. Latham's dish was the same Olga that had run away with the Day's treasure-box? Was it Olga Cedarstrom, with her name changed, and Stella had known it to be so, all the time?

Really, when Janice thought of this she felt exceedingly angry with Stella. She had intended, after Stella had acted so meanly toward Amy Carringford, to let the farmer's daughter strictly alone in the future. She would have as little to do with her as it was possible, considering that she had to go to school with her. That was at first. Then her anger had cooled. Now it was aflame again.

But if Stella knew positively that the Swedish girl who had visited Mrs. Johnson had been married, and therefore her name was no longer Cedarstrom, Janice was determined to find it out. Unpleasant as might be to ask Stella, Janice would do just this.

She knew Stella had returned from her visit to the lake shore resort. Janice had seen her flying past in the Latham car more than once within the week. Janice could not stop her at such times; she could not expect Stella to put herself out at all to give her any information. So she set forth one August morning to trudge through the heat and dust out to the Latham farm. There was no interurban car that would take her near there; and how she did wish daddy could afford an automobile!

Indeed, just as she turned up the road leading to the door of the Latham house a motor-car turned, too, into the road, powdering Janice with dust. The latter saw the malicious smile of Stella Latham, driving the car herself, as the farmer's daughter looked back over her shoulder at the pedestrian.

Janice kept grimly on; nor would she show Stella that she was hurt or ruffled in temper. Stella waited on the porch for her schoolmate to approach. A man came to take the car around to the garage.

"Well, what do you want?" asked Stella, when Janice came within hearing. "Are you begging more old clothes for that protegee of yours, Amy Carringford?"

"I have come on my own business, Stella," said Janice gently. "It is something that I want to know, and you can tell me."

Stella was smiling broadly; but it was by no means a pleasant smile. She was spiteful. She had found since coming back from her summer vacation that the girls had not forgotten her behavior toward Amy Carringford and some of them still resented it. She was nowhere near as popular as she had been; and even her father's motorcar could not regain the friendship of many of her schoolmates whom she wished to be chums with.

Stella laid all this to "that sly Janice Day." She dared not so speak of Janice before her mother; for Mrs. Latham liked Janice. Just now, however, Stella's mother was not at home, and she felt free treat Janice in any way she chose.

"Of course, you expect me to tell you everything you want to know, Janice Day," said Stella. "But I don't know why I should."

"You will tell me, won't you, Stella, if you really know that the Swedish girl who broke your mother's dish is the same girl who used to work for daddy and me?"

"Why should I?"

"Because it is the right thing to do, isn't it? You do not know what it means to us if we can find that girl—"

"And why should I care?" snapped Stella "You never did anything for me, Janice Day."

"I think I tried to—at least once," her schoolmate said mildly.

"Nothing of the kind! You did something for Amy Carringford—the pauper! You were spoons with her then, and you wanted to get her to my party. You begged an invitation for her and then dressed her up. like a freak so she could come, and—"

"That is not so, Stella," Janice interrupted with some spirit. "But I want to talk about Olga, not about Amy."

"Go along with your old Olga!" cried the other angrily. "I wouldn't tell you anything about her if I knew."

"I shall go to Mrs. Johnson again then. And if Mrs. Johnson is not willing to tell me, I shall come back and see your mother."

"Oh! you will?" sneered Stella. "So you think the Johnsons will tell you about Olga's last name do you?"

"I will ask them."

"Good luck to you!" jeered Stella, as Janice went on through the Latham's yard. "You can ask anybody you like, but you'll get nothing out of me I assure you!"

Janice made no further reply. She was hurt to the quick, for she did not believe she deserved any such treatment from her schoolmate. And it did, too, worry Janice Day when she knew she had an enemy.

"Friends are so much nicer to make than enemies," was one of daddy's sayings; and his little daughter always bore that fact in mind when in contact with her schoolmates.

But really, one could do nothing with Stella Latham, once that subborn person had made up her mind to be "mad." Stella gloried in showing all the perversity with which she was cursed; so Janice sighed and gave it up.

"No use. I hope I won't have to ask Mrs. Latham. Then there will be trouble, I fear."

The walk over the hill and down the lane, crossing the brook Gummy Carringford had once spoken of, was a pleasant walk, after all. It was not dusty, and there were shade trees part of the way. By the time Janice came to the little house which her father and she had once visited to look for Olga, she was quite cool and collected again.

But as soon as she drew near to the tenant house the girl was startled. There was not a sign of life about it. There were no wagons or farm tools about the sheds or barnyard. There were no cattle in the stable, nor pigs in the pen, nor poultry in the wired run.

"Goodness me! have the Johnsons gone, too?" cried Janice.

She hurried to the little house. There were no curtains at the windows, and she could see right through the empty house.

"That's what Stella meant!" exclaimed Janice. "Oh, the mean, mean thing! To let me walk away over here without telling me that they had gone! And now she is waiting back there to laugh at me when I return!" Janice Day did not like to be laughed at any more than other people. And she particularly shrank from facing the sarcastic Stella on this occasion.

"At least, I will make some inquiries elsewhere, first," she thought, and set forth along the public highway, on which the little house fronted, toward another dwelling that was in sight.

There were people in this house, that was sure. There were children playing in the yard and a pleasant-faced woman on the front porch, sewing and keeping an eye on the children.

She did put out a somewhat forbidding air when Janice turned in at the gate; but then she saw the girl had no bag or sample case, so she brightened up again.

"You haven't anything to sell, I guess?" the woman began, even before Janice uttered a word.

"Oh, no," answered the girl.

"Come up and sit down," said the woman. Then she added: "Dear me, you are only a little girl. It's hot walking. Will you have a drink of water?"

"No, thank you. I got a drink at the well back there," and Janice pointed at the tenant house on Mr. Latham's place.

"Oh, yes; Latham's cottage."

"The Johnsons used to live there, did they not? asked the caller.

"Swedes—yes," said the woman.

"I was looking for them."

"But goodness, you're not a Swede!" exclaimed the woman.

"Oh, no," laughed Janice. "But I wanted to see them about a friend of theirs—a girl who used to work for us."

"Oh! I thought you couldn't be a foreigner," said the woman. "Well," she added, "I'm afraid you'll have to go a long way to find out anything from the Johnsons."

"You don't mean—"

"I mean they've left the country," said the woman.

"Left this part of the country?"

"They have gone back to Sweden," said Janice's informant, nodding over her sewing. "Yes. They had a stroke of luck. Mrs. Johnson told me herself in her broken talk. Near's I could find out her grandfather had died and left her a bit of property, and she and her family were going back to the place they came from ten years ago, to attend to it. Lucky folks, some of them foreigners. I don't see for the life of me why they ever leave their homes and come over here, when they've got money and land comin' to them at home."

The woman talked on, even faster than Miss Peckham was wont to talk. But her volubility gave Janice a chance to recover her self-possession. She saw quite clearly that her errand had come to naught. Even if the Lathams positively knew the missing Olga had been named Cedarstrom before her marriage they probably did not know where Olga now was.

The people who were the more likely to know, these Johnsons, had gone back to their native land. Janice wondered, despairingly, if Olga had gone back to Sweden too.

But the girl was able to hide her trouble from this new acquaintance. The woman was glad to have her stay— and talk. Rather, the hostess did the talking. It was evident that she got little chance for conversation, living as she did on this rather lonely road.

Janice planned what she would do, however, while she listened. Rather than go back and perhaps have another quarrel with Stella, she decided she would go home and tell her father what she had found out. He might write to Mrs. Latham for information—if the farmer's wife had any—regarding Olga.

At least, it was one sure thing, that such information as Janice had obtained was much too late. An ocean separated her now from the Johnsons, Olga's friends.



CHAPTER XXVIII. GUMMY COMES INTO HIS OWN

Janice bade her new acquaintance good-bye with some difficulty. The woman by the roadside did love to talk. But when the girl was well rested she went on.

She remembered very clearly the way she and daddy had come to the little Johnson cottage in the automobile. So she knew she could find her way back. One thing she did not take into consideration, however; that was, that an automobile gets over the ground a great deal faster than one can walk.

An hour later, past mid-afternoon, dusty and footsore, she was still marching towards Greensboro along a very pleasant, but a very wearisome, road. She heard the rumble of wheels behind her, but she was too tired to turn to look.

Motor car after motor car had passed her while she was trudging along in the dust, and not one driver stopped to offer her a lift.

But a friendly voice now hailed her as a horse was drawn down to a walk. It reached Janice Day's ear like an angelic whisper:

"Don't you want to ride, Miss?"

She wheeled about with almost a scream of joy. "Gummy Carringford!"

"Jicksy! Is that you, Janice?" gasped the boy. "I'd never know it, you're so smothered in dust. What are you doing away out here? Get in—do!"

He offered her a hand and pulled her up to the high step into the front of the covered wagon. She almost fell to the seat.

"You are the best boy!" she gasped.

"Ain't I? They can't get along without me at my house. What under the sun are you wandering around for away out here?"

She told him in broken sentences, and he sympathized with her because of her disappointment.

"I could have told you the Johnsons had gone, if you'd asked me. But I did not suppose you were interested in them any more," he said.

"And daddy, being out of the bank, did not know that Mr. Johnson had withdrawn his account and sailed for Europe. Oh, dear me, it is so exasperating! Everything about that Olga, and connected with her, is so mysterious."

"I wonder if I couldn't find out something about her in Pickletown?" suggested Gummy.

"Daddy has been there often, I believe," she said doubtfully.

"But not of late."

"Why, no, I suppose not. He's been tied to the house with a 'glass leg,'" cried Janice laughing a little.

"You know I deliver orders over there twice a week for Mr. Harriman. A lot of those people can't even talk English. We've a Swede for a clerk in the store. They write down what they want for me, and he puts up the orders.

"But I know a lot of them to talk to—especially the boys that work in the pickle factories I'll begin by asking them," said Gummy, with eagerness, for he wanted to help.

"That will be nice of you, Gummy," Janice said. "You never do know when we might come across some news of her."

"And you say you think she's married?"

"It may be so. To Willie Sangreen. At least, she was going with a man by that name when she worked for us."

"Don't know any Sangreens over at Pickletown," said Gummy, shaking his head. "And of course I haven't seen your Olga."

"That is so, Gummy. But if the girl at Johnson's that night was really Olga Cedarstrom, you'd know her again, wouldn't you?"

"Guess I would if I saw her," declared the boy. "No fear about that. I'll keep my eyes open, Janice."

With this promise he chirruped to the horse, that jogged along without paying very much attention to Gummy. He knew the road better than the boy did, for he had been over it many more times.

"Do you suppose that lawyer that came to see my mother will cheat us out of our home, Janice?" asked the boy suddenly, showing where his thoughts were anchored.

"Not if it can be helped, Gummy," returned the girl sympathetically. "I know daddy's friend, Mr. Payne, will do all he can for her."

"He hasn't sent any word to her, or anything," sighed Gummy. "We just don't know what to do."

"All you can do is to sit tight and hold on, I guess," Janice said. "That is what daddy says he does when things look stormy for him."

"But, you see, it means so much to us," said the boy, shaking his head. "Jicksy! And me with such a miserable old name!"

"Why, Gummy!"

"How'd you like to be called Zerubbabelbubble, or something like that?" he demanded. "Nice enough for you. 'Janice'! That's a fancy name. But 'Gumswith'! Jicksy!"

"Why, Gummy!" exclaimed the girl again, didn't know you hated it so."

"I do. I don't talk about it. I know Pa gave it to me because he thought a heap of his half brother. And Uncle John Gumswith was a nice man, I guess. He set my father up in business in the first place, when he was married."

"Oh, is that so, Gummy?'

"Yes! Don't kick about the old name before Momsy. You see, I guess Uncle John wanted them to name a boy after him; and maybe they thought if they did so it might do me some good sometime."

"Oh, Gummy! That your uncle would give you money because you were named after him?"

"Yes," said Gummy, nodding. "I don't know. But—"

"And your uncle's never been heard from? You never saw him, even?"

"Nor he me," grinned Gummy. "He went off to Australia and never wrote. He was always traveling around the world, Pa said; and he never did write. Just walked in on his folks without announcing he was coming." "A regular wanderer," said Janice.

"And now, jicksy!" exclaimed Gummy, vigorously, "how I'd like to have him walk in on us now."

"Oh, Gummy" she said eagerly, catching the drift of his desire. "With his pockets full of money!"

The boy nodded vigorously. "You see, Janice, it would be worth while being called 'Gumswith' then, sure enough."

Janice could not blame Gummy Carringford feeling as he did. He really should have something to pay him for being called by such an atrocious name! And Janice herself would be glad to have rich relative walk into the Day house and present daddy—with an automobile, for instance.

They came in sight of the house at Eight Hundred and Forty-five Knight Street just as the very kind of automobile Janice would have loved to own was drawing up before the front door—a handsome, great, big touring car, big enough for her to have taken most of her friends out riding in at once.

"Oh, who is that?" she cried.

"Man. Don't know him," said Gummy, cheerfully, as the single occupant of the tonneau stepped out of the car and entered the gate.

He was a well-dressed man, of more than middle age, and Janice's heart began to beat faster. It did seem as though something must be about to happen.

Daddy was on the porch and she could see him greet the gentleman without rising. The stranger took a seat at Mr. Day's request. And if Janice had been near enough to have heard the first words that passed between them, she would have suffered a great drop in the temperature of her excitement.

"How's the leg, Broxton?" asked the visitor.

"Coming on, Randolph. What's the news?"

"Well, yes, I have news," said the lawyer, nodding.

"I know it. Or you would not have found time to get up into this part of the town. Well, what can you tell Mrs. Carringford?"

"Nothing much about that Mullen Lane property, I fear, that she will want to hear."

"Too bad, too bad," said Broxton Day. "I am sorry for her. She is a hard working woman—and proud. No chance of helping her?"

"I can settle the case for five hundred dollars. I cannot connect Abel Strout with this shake-down—for that is what it is. The woman up in Michigan never heard of her great-uncle's property down here till this little Schrimpe told her. But we can't connect him with Strout. Strout's skirts are clear. And this Schrimpe had a perfect legal right to drum up trade. He's that kind of lawyer," said Mr. Payne, with disgust.

"Five hundred dollars—and she will still owe Abel Strout a thousand on the mortgage," sighed Mr. Day.

"Yes. But I suppose, in time, the property will be worth it."

"It's worth it now," said Mr. Day. "That is what is the matter with Strout. But Mrs. Carringford hasn't the money to spare. And at the present time nobody would put a second mortgage on the property."

"I suppose the woman up in Michigan gets about twenty-five—maybe fifty—dollars out of it. That would settle any quitclaim of this character. Half a dozen other heirs were bought off at the time; but she was overlooked. The rest of the five hundred Mrs. Carringford can raise it—will be split between Schrimpe and his principal."

"There are some mighty mean people in this world," said Broxton Day, grimly.

"You've said it," agreed the lawyer. "Now, maybe I'd better see Mrs. Carringford. I understand she is here?"

"Yes."

"Do you know much about her?"

"I know she is a fine woman. They came here from Napsburg after the husband died—"

"Alexander Carringford, wasn't he?" asked Mr. Payne, taking some papers from his pocket.

"I believe so."

"They came originally from Cleveland?"

"Maybe."

"A correspondent of mine in Cleveland has written me about a family of Carringfords, and I shouldn't be surprised if these were the same people. If they are—"

"What's all the mystery, Payne?" asked Broxton Day, with sudden interest, for he saw that the lawyer meant more than he had said.

"If this is Alexander Carringford's widow, I don't know but my news is in two pieces."

"Meaning?"

"Bad news, and good news. Let's call the woman."

At that moment Janice, who had gone into the house through the back way, appeared at the open door.

"This is my little housekeeper, Randolph," said Broxton Day, smiling proudly upon his daughter. "Janice, this is Mr. Payne."

The girl came forward without timidity, but without boldness, and accepted the visitor's hand.

"Is Mrs. Carringford out there?" asked Janice's father.

"Yes, Daddy. And Gummy."

"'Gummy'!" ejaculated the lawyer. "What's that? A game, or something to eat?"

Janice's dear laughter rang out with daddy's bass tones. "Oh, no, sir," she said. "Gummy is 'Gumswith Carringford.'"

"My soul!" ejaculated the lawyer, getting up quickly from his chair, "it is the right family. Come inside. Let's see Mrs. Carringford somewhere where we can talk without the neighbors seeing and hearing everything."

For he had noticed the bowed blinds of Miss Peckham's cottage only a few yards from the end of the porch.

"Tell her to come into the living room, Janice," said Mr. Day, rising slowly and reaching for his crutches. But it was evident that he understood the lawyer's excitement no more than Janice did.

The girl ran back to the kitchen and urged Mrs. Carringford to come in. "And Gummy, too," she said. "Maybe he wants you. It is Mr. Payne, and he is daddy's lawyer."

"It's about the home, Gummy!" ejaculated Mrs. Carringford.

"Oh, I hope he'll tell us how to beat out that Abel Strout!"

"Maybe it's to say that Mr. Strout can take our home," faltered Mrs. Carringford.

"Come on, Momsy!" said her big boy. "I'm not afraid. If worse comes to worst, it won't be so long before I can support you and the kids, anyway."

Now Janice thought that was a very nice speech and she remembered to tell daddy about it afterward.

They went into the living room and Mr. Day introduced Mrs. Carringford to his companion. The latter looked hard at Gummy.

"What is your name, boy?" he asked rather sternly.

"Carringford, too, sir," said Gummy, politely.

"The whole of it!" commanded the lawyer.

"Er—Gumswith Carringford," said the boy, with flashing eye but cheeks that would turn red.

"Indeed?" returned the lawyer, staring oddly at Gummy. "You are something of a boy, I take it." Then he wheeled to confront Mrs. Carringford.

"I am told," Mr. Payne said, "that your husband was Alexander Carringford, of Cleveland?"

The woman was somewhat surprised, but said that that statement was correct. She could not see, during the next few minutes' cross-examination, what these questions had to do with that little cottage in Mullen Lane, and whether her family was to be turned out of it or not.

After even his legal suspicion was satisfied as to Mrs. Carringford's identity, Mr. Payne said, again looking at Gummy:

"Did you and your husband name this boy after a certain relative named John Gumswith. Mrs. Carringford?"

"My husband's elder brother. Yes, sir. Gumswith is named after his Uncle John."

"Humph! I should consider it something of a punishment if I were the boy," muttered the lawyer. Then he asked:

"Have you heard from this relative—this John Gumswith—recently?"

"No, sir. Not for fifteen years," said Mrs. Carringford, her face suddenly paling.

"Do you know where he is?"

"I only know that he started for Australia fifteen years ago."

"Sit down, Mrs. Carringford," said Mr. Day softly. "I assure you this is nothing to worry about."

I—should—say—not," agreed the lawyer. "Quite the opposite. And the boy need not look so scared, either. If he can stand that name he carries around with him—"

"Boy!" exclaimed Mr. Payne, "what would you say if somebody gave you two thousand pounds?"

"Er—what, sir?" gasped Gummy. "Two thousand pounds of what? Must be an elephant! That's a ton."

How Mr. Payne did laugh at that! But neither Gummy nor Janice saw anything funny in his speech. Mrs. Carringford was watching the lawyer's face, and she said nothing.

"I mean two thousand pounds in money. That is something like ten thousand dollars. How about it?" asked Mr. Payne again.

"Me?" exploded Gummy.

"Yes. Because your name is 'Gumswith Carringford.' Isn't it worth it?" chuckled the lawyer.

Gummy looked all around, paling and flushing by turn. Then he grinned widely and looked at Janice.

"Jicksy!" he murmured, "the old name is worth something, after all, isn't it?"



CHAPTER XXIX. "BUT WE LOSE"

It was such a happy surprise for Mrs. Carringford— and for Gummy as well—that they were well prepared for the piece of bad news which Mr. Payne had first told to Mr. Broxton Day. A five hundred dollar loss on the Mullen Lane property did not look so big when it was understood that, through Gummy, the Carringfords were going to get almost ten thousand dollars.

It seemed that more than a year before, Mr. John Gumswith, of Melbourne, Australia, had died, leaving a considerable fortune to friends he had made there and with whom he had lived for more than a dozen years. But he had left a legacy, too, "to any son that my brother, Alexander Carringford, of Cleveland, Ohio, U. S. A., may have had who has been duly christened 'Gumswith' after me, to perpetuate my family name."

"Of course," said Mr. Payne, dryly, "nobody challenged the will, and so it was probated. I should, myself, doubt the good sense of a man who would fasten such an ugly name upon a boy whom he had never seen, and who never did him any harm—"

"Mr. Payne," breathed Gummy, when he heard this, and earnestly, "for ten thousand dollars I'll let anybody call me anything he wants to. Names don't break any bones."

At that Mr. Payne and Mr. Day laughed louder than they had before. But Janice knew that Gummy was not selfish, nor did he think so much of money. He was delighted that he could help his mother in her sore need.

"At any rate," said Mr. Payne, "the administrator of Mr. John Gumswith's estate had his legal adviser communicate with Cleveland lawyers; and they traced the Carringford family to Napsburg. Then I was requested to find them, and—they have found me!" and he smiled.

"I congratulate you, madam. Of course, the courts will allow a proper amount to be used by you for Gumswith's support."

"I guess not!" said Gummy. "I'm almost supporting myself—am I not, Mother? The money's for you and the children."

"Oh, no, Gumswith, I—I cannot use your fortune," cried the mother quickly.

"I have not yet finished," resumed the lawyer, with a queer smile. "The boy has been left two thousand pounds for his name. The father receives a thousand pounds, payable either to him, or, if he be dead, to his widow. So you see there will be another five thousand dollars coming to you, Mrs. Carringford."

At that, Mrs. Carringford for the first time lost control of herself. She hugged Gummy and sobbed aloud.

"Pretty fine boy. Pretty fine boy," said Mr. Payne.

"He is that," agreed daddy, smiling across at Janice. "He put out the fire our chimney, didn't he Janice?"

So this made them all laugh and they were all right again. There was much to talk over before Mr. Payne went, besides the bad fortune about the Mullen Lane property. And Mrs. Carringford and the Days talked after Gummy had rushed out to drive back to Harriman's store. The dinner was late that night in the Day house.

Indeed, Janice forgot, in all the confusion and excitement, to tell her father where she had been that afternoon, what she had gone for, and how sadly she had been disappointed.

All this wonderful fortune for the Carringfords continued to create so much excitement at the Day house, as well as in the little cottage in Mullen Lane, that for several days Janice scarcely thought about Olga Cedarstrom and the lost treasure-box.

For out of the good luck of the Carringfords, bad fortune for the Days suddenly raised its head. Mrs. Carringford had a good deal of extra work to do, anyway, for she had to go to the lawyer's office and to the court, and interest herself in many things she had known little about before. She was fighting to save her home.

Indeed, Amy declared the Carringford family did not know "whether it was on its head or its heels." Only Gummy. Nothing seemed to disturb Gummy. And he would not give up his place with Mr. Harriman.

"He keeps saying," Amy told Janice, laughing and sobbing together, "that the ten thousand dollars is for the family. He is going to keep on working until school begins, and even then after school and on Saturdays. Really, Janice, he is darling brother."

"I believe you," said Janice wistfully, for of late she had begun to realize that a household of just two people was awfully small.

It became quite shocking when she suddenly understood that Mrs. Carringford must give up looking after the Day household and attend thereafter strictly to her own family. Of course, Mr. Day had seen this from the first; but it came as a shock to his little daughter.

"Oh, but Amy, and Gummy, and the little ones get everything! They get their money and are going to own their home, and get their mother all the time, too. It is fine for them, Daddy, but we lose!"

"I am afraid we do," said her father, nodding soberly. "We shall have to go back to the mercies of the intelligence office, or go to boarding."

"No, no!" cried Janice to this last. "Not while vacation lasts, at any rate. Why! I've learned a lot from Mrs. Carringford, and we can get along."

"You are a dear little homemaker, Janice," he said. "When you get a few more years on your shoulders I have no doubt that we shall have as nice a home as we once had before dear mother went away. But you cannot do everything. We cannot afford two in service—a cook and a housemaid. We shall have to struggle along, 'catch as catch can,' for some time I fear."

"But no boarding-house," declared Janice. "No giving up our own dear home, Daddy."

"All right. I am going to get down tomorrow, crutches or no crutches, and I will make the rounds of the agencies."

"Oh, dear!" she sighed. Then suddenly, for she was looking out of the window: "Who do you suppose that is, Daddy, coming in at the side gate? Why! It's a black woman—awfully black. And she—"

Janice left off breathlessly and ran to the kitchen door. A woman of more than middle age but, as said herself, "still mighty spry," approached the porch.

Hers was not an unintelligent face. Her dark eye beamed upon Janice most kindly. Her white, sound teeth gleamed behind a triumphant smile. She carried a shabby bag, but she dropped that and put out both hands as she came to the door.

"Ma bressed baby!" she cried in a voice that shook with emotion. "Nobody's got to tell me who you is! You's your darlin' mamma's livin' image! Ma sweet Miss Laura, back a little chile ag'in!"

The dark eyes were suddenly flooded and the tears ran down the negro woman's plump cheeks. She was not wrinkled, and if her tight, kinky hair was a mite gray, she did not have the appearance of an old person in any way. Her voice was round, and sweet, and tender.

"You don' know me, honey. You kyan't 'member Mammy Blanche. But she done hol' you in her arms w'en you was a mite of a baby, jes' as she held you dear mamma —my Miss Laura. Ah was her mammy, an' she growed up right under ma eye. Don' you understun', honey? The Avions was mah white folks.

"When Mistah Day come co'tin' an' merried yo' mamma, and kerrled her off here to Greensboro, Ah come along, too. An' Ah nebber would o' lef' you, only ma crippled brudder, Esek, an' his crippled wife done need me to tak' care ob dem.

"But Esek's daid. An' here Ah is back, chile—Ma soul an' body! ef dar ain' Mistah Brocky Day on crutches!"

"Blanche! Mammy Blanche!" exclaimed the man with real warmth, as well as wonder, in his tone. "Is it really you?"

"It's mah own brack se'f!" cried the woman, as daddy came hobbling forward to meet her just as though she were the finest company that had ever come to the Day house.

"You couldn't be more welcome if you were a queen, Mammy Blanche," he cried. "You know—?"

He halted, and his own countenance fell. The old woman clung tightly to his hand with both of hers.

"Ah, yes; Ah got yo' letter long, long ago, Mistah Brocky. It nigh broke my heart. Ma lil' Miss Laura! But, glory!" and she turned suddenly to Janice, "here she is ober again!"

"I know it," said Broxton Day, wiping his eyes. "Come in and sit down, Mammy. Janice does not remember you, I suppose. But I remember well enough that we never had any housekeeping troubles when Mammy Blanche was on hand."

"Sho' not! Sho' not," chuckled the old woman. "And Mammy Blanche jest as spry now, an' able to do for you, as she used to be."

"What? Have you come to stay with us awhile, Mammy Blanche?" asked Broxton Day. "Your brother?"

"Esek is daid. His wife's gone back to her own people. Ah ain't got nobody, nor nohin' of mah own in dis here worl' Mistah Brocky, onless dey is under dis here roof. I has come to stay, sah, if you is of a min' to give mah ol' bones house room."

Janice had been breathless. But she had listened, and gradually she had begun to understand. She could remember a good deal that her dear mother had told her about Mammy Blanche. And this was she!

The girl put her hand confidently into that of the black woman's. She looked up at her father brightly.

"I take it all back, Daddy," she murmured. "I was ungrateful and suspicious of fate, wasn't I? We don't lose."



CHAPTER XXX. WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN EXPECTED

It took several days for Janice to understand thoroughly just what it meant to have Mammy Blanche in the house. Of course, Mrs. Carringford had been perfectly capable; yet she felt that she must ask Janice or Mr. Day once in a while about things.

Not Mammy Blanche! She knew what to do, and how to do it, and just what "the white folks" wanted. She remembered just as perfectly how Mr. Day liked things on the table, and what he was fond of, and even how he wanted his bed made, as though she had only been absent from the house a week instead of ten years.

"Why, bress your heart, honey," she said to Janice, "Ah come into dis here house when it was fust built. Ah cleaned it wid mah own han's. Ah put up de fust curtains at de windahs. Ah knowed where everything was in dem days. "But Ah spec' now you's had so many no-count folks in de house fixin' fo' you dat Ah can't find a bressed thing. Dars's dat old walnut wardrobe up in de sto'room. It come from de Avion place, it did. Ah bet de cobwebs ain't been swep' off de top o' dat wardrobe since yo' poor mamma died." "It was too tall for Mrs. Carringford or me to reach it," admitted Janice.

"Well, Ah's gwine to give dis place one fine over-haulin; come dis fall," went on Mammy Blanche. "Ah'll fix dem cobwebs."

It proved to be unnecessary for Janice to worry about the housekeeping in any particular. But she had not lost another worry, and in spite of all the wonderful things that had happened, and the interesting matters that were continually cropping up, the lost treasure-box containing the mementoes of her mother was continually fretting her mind.

The opening of school was drawing near, and Janice began to take exciting little "peeps" between the covers of textbooks. She loved study, and daddy had been insistent this summer that she should let lessons strictly alone.

She had plenty of time to sit in the kitchen while Mammy Blanche was at work there, listening to wonderful tales of her mother's childhood, and of the "doin's" on the Avion plantation on the other shore of the Ohio River.

"All gone now, chile," sighed Mammy Blanche. "Somebody else livin' in the Avion home."

But better than all, Janice, the homemaker learned many new and interesting things about housekeeping. Mammy Blanche had a "sleight," as she called it, in doing housework, and Janice might well copy her methods.

Amy came often to see her, of course; and Gummy was at the house almost every day with orders from the store. One Saturday morning, while Janice was sweeping the porch, she saw Gummy driving toward the house almost as madly as he had the day the chimney caught fire.

"Why, Gummy!" she cried, running out to meet him as he drew up the horse at the curb, "what is the matter?"

"You'd never guess!" shouted the boy. "What do you suppose? I just saw that pickle-girl in Olga-town."

"What? gasped Janice.

"I—I mean I've seen that Pickletown in Olga—Oh, jicksy!. Do you know what I mean, Janice Day?"

"Yes! Yes!" she cried. "You've seen Olga."

"Then jump right in here and I'll drive you to her," said the boy, without running the risk of another lapsus linguae.

Without waiting even for a hat, and throwing her broom back over the fence, Janice scrambled in. But when Gummy started the horse she said to him:

"Don't think you are driving in a chariot race. You'll kill Mr. Harriman's poor old nag. Drive slower, Gummy. She won't get away, will she?"

"No. I think she's been living in that house some time. But I never go there for orders, and I never happened to see her before."

"Where is it?"

"Away down by the canal," said Gummy.

"Oh! Then it is a long way off."

"Yes."

"What will Mr. Harriman say?"

"There are not many orders this morning. And this is important, Janice."

"I guess it is," agreed the girl, her face pale but her eyes sparkling with excitement.

They did not say much after that until they came in sight of the house by the canal. Oh, if it should be Olga! Janice began to tremble. Should she have gone to daddy first about it?

But daddy was still on crutches and was not fit to come out in this delivery wagon, that was sure.

What should she say to Olga if it were she? Ought she to stop and ask a policeman to go with them to the house? And yet it was a fact that she absolutely did not know for sure whether Olga had taken the treasure-box or not.

Suddenly she uttered a little exclamation. Gummy glanced ahead, too.

"Yes," he said, "that's the woman. That's the one I saw that night at Stella Latham's.

"It—it is Olga Cedarstrom," murmured Janice. Gummy drew the old horse to a stop. Janice leaped down. The Swedish woman turned and looked into Janice's blazing countenance. Her own dull face lit up and she actually smiled.

"Vell!" she exclaimed, "iss it Janice Day? I bane glad to see you. Iss your fader well?"

"Oh, Olga!" gasped Janice.

"Huh? What iss it the matter?"

"We have looked everywhere for you!"

"For me? Why for me? I don't vork no more. I keep house for my hoosban'," and Olga smiled broadly.

"You—you are married to Mr. Sangreen?" asked Janice doubtfully.

"I bane married right avay when I left you. We go to his folks—dey leev up in Michigan. He try vork dere and I coom back on a veesit to Yon Yonson's wife. He vork for Misder Latham."

"Yes, I know!" cried Janice, anxiously.

"Now Willie bane coom back to his old yob at de pickle vorks. And how is you? You look fine."

"Oh, Olga, we have been dreadfully worried. When— when you went away from our house did you see a little box—like a jewel box? I left it on your trunk in the storeroom."

"On my troonk?" repeated the woman. "Where it stood in de storeroom?"

"Oh, yes!" cried Janice clasping her hands.

It had suddenly impressed her that beyond any doubt, Olga was not a thief. Whatever had happened to the treasure-box, Olga did not knowingly have it in her possession. "I remember de leetle box. Yes! You t'ink I take it?"

"We haven't been able to find it since you left, Olga," cried Janice.

"Huh! I saw it. But—Here! This boy will drive us back mit him to your house?"

"Oh, yes, Olga!" cried Janice, with a glance at Gummy, who nodded.

"I'll go mit you," said the woman, and immediately she climbed to the high seat." Janice followed her. Gummy turned the horse about and away they went on the return journey.

On the way Janice thought it best to say nothing more about the lost treasure-box; but she told Olga of how she had tried to trace her through the Johnsons.

"My bad look!" cried Olga. "I break a dish by that Latham woman's house and she vant me to pay for it. Huh! People ought not to use such spensive dishes. Me, I use common chinnyware in my house."

When they arrived at the house on Knight Street, Olga jumped briskly down and followed Janice inside. Gummy called after them that he would wait. He was so excited and interested himself that he could not leave until the mystery was cleared up;

"Ve go oop to dot storeroom," declared Olga and proceeded to do so, with Janice trembling and hoping beside her.

Once in the room the woman seized a strong chair, climbed upon it, and, being tall herself, she could reach over the carved strip of woodwork on the front of the wardrobe to the space that lay behind. In a moment she brought something forth covered with dust and cobwebs that caused Janice to utter a shriek of delight. "That iss it, yes?" said Olga. "I be mad mit you dot morning I leaf here. The box was on my troonk and when Willie come up the stairs for it, I grab de box and pitch it up hyar. I don't know you vant it, Janice— and your fader."

"Well," sighed Broxton Day, when he heard the good news and had the treasure-box in his hands, "'All's well that ends well.' But what a peck of trouble that Swedish girl made us!"

"No, no I" exclaimed Janice warmly. "I did it. It was my fault. I was the careless one, or the box would not have been where she could see it. But I am awfully glad, Daddy, that Olga proved not to be a thief."

Daddy showed her the tiny spring in the bottom of the box which, when released, enabled him to lift up the thin partition. He removed the thin packet of letters, and put them in a leather case, placing the case into the wall safe.

"I know where they are now, my dear. Do what you will with the other keepsakes and the treasure-box itself. I cannot tell you how glad I am to get these letters back."

But Janice thought she did know something about that.

"That Mexican mine business is not likely to cause us any more trouble until spring, anyway," said daddy one night at dinner.

"Oh, Daddy! then won't you have to go down there?" Janice cried.

"Not likely. Fact is, there is a big fight on in the mining country, and the mines have got to shut down. But the government promises us that we shall be able to open up again next spring. We might as well sit tight and hold on, as I tell them. I'm sorry that so much of our funds are tied up in the business, however. Politics below the Rio Grande are 'mighty onsartain,' as Brother Jase would say."

"Now that Mammy Blanche is here with us, I would not have to go to Poketown, even if you did go to Mexico, Daddy. Would I?"

"M-mm! Well, that's hard telling," he replied, with twinkling eyes. "Let's not cross that bridge till we come to it."

So Janice saw nothing but a cheerful vista before her —with school coming soon, pleasure in study, plenty of fun between times, and such a fortunate state of affairs at Eight Hundred and Forty-five Knight Street that she did not have to worry about daddy's comfort or her own at all.

Mrs. Carringford had had no easy time of it with the shyster lawyer and the others who were making trouble for her over her property. But in the end her own lawyer triumphed; and then the mortgage on the place was cleared off, much to the satisfaction of both the Carringfords and the Days.

"It does seem," said Janice with an ecstatic sigh, to Amy Carringford one day when both girls had their sewing on the porch, "that everything always does turn out for the best for us Days."

"Humph!" returned Amy, threading her needle, "I guess they wouldn't turn out so 'right' if you and your father didn't do something to turn 'em out."

And, perhaps, that was so, too.

THE END