‘O-o-o-h!’ screamed Polly. ‘There comes a piece of the floor. They’ve sent it all made, in three pieces. What fun! We’ll have it all up and ready to sleep in before we blow the horn!’ ‘And here’s a roll of straw matting,’ said Phil, depositing a huge bundle on the ground near the girls. ‘I’ll cut the rope to save your teeth!’ ‘Green and white plaid!’ exclaimed Bell. ‘Well! Mrs. Howard did have her wits about her!’ ‘Oh, do let me blow the horn!’ teased the irrepressible Polly. ‘Here are a looking-glass and a towel-rack and a Shaker rocking-chair,’ called Philip; ‘guess they’re going to stay the rest of the summer.’ ‘Yes, of course they wouldn’t want a looking-glass if they were only going to stay a month or two,’ laughed Bell. ‘Dear Aunt Truth, if you won’t let me turn a single decorous little hand-spring, or blow the horn, or do anything nice, will you let us use all that new white mosquito-netting? Bell says that it has been in the storehouse for two years, and it would be just the thing for decorating Elsie’s tent.’ ‘Why, of course you may have it, Polly, and anything else that you can find. There! I hear Dicky’s voice in the distance; perhaps the girls are coming.’ Bell and Polly darted through the swarm of tents, and looked up the narrow path that led to the brook. Sure enough, Margery and Laura were strolling towards home with little Anne and Dick dangling behind, after the manner of children. Margery carried a small string of trout, and Dick the inevitable tin pail in which he always kept an unfortunate frog or two. The girls had discovered that he was in the habit of crowding the cover tightly over the pail and keeping his victims shut up for twenty-four hours, after which, he said, they were nice and tame—so very tame, as it transpired, that they generally gave up the ghost in a few hours after their release. Margery had with difficulty persuaded him of his cruelty, and the cover had been pierced with a certain number of air-holes. ‘Guess the loveliest thing that could possibly happen!’ called Bell at the top of her voice. ‘Elsie has come,’ answered Margery in a second, nobody knew why; ‘let me hug her this minute!’ ‘With those fish?’ laughed Polly. ‘No! you’ll have to wait until day after to-morrow, and then your guess will be right. Isn’t it almost too good to be true?’ ‘And she is almost well,’ added Bell, joyfully, slipping her arm through Margery’s and squeezing it in sheer delight. ‘Mrs. Howard says she is really and truly better. Oh, if Elsie Howard in bed is the loveliest, dearest thing in the world, what will it be like to have her out of it and with us in all our good times!’ ‘Has she always been ill since you knew her?’ asked Laura.