“Well, I suppose he’ll get back when he’s good and ready. I do hope Jennie can come. If she doesn’t I’ll just have to shut up the store. ’Twon’t make much difference, though, I guess; what’s sold here in two days wouldn’t pay Jennie’s fare across. But I got everything ready if she should come. I marked things plain so’s she can tell how much to ask. I spent about three hours doing it, too.” She looked proudly about the store and Chub and Harry, their gazes following hers, saw that almost everything in sight had been labeled in some way with the price. Usually small paper bags had been laid upon the article and the figures printed on the bag. “It must have been a lot of trouble,” murmured Harry. “So it was, but Jennie hasn’t got enough sense to look after the place if things aren’t marked right out plain. There he is, ain’t he?” A buggy containing a small, freckled-faced boy drew slowly up at the edge of the sidewalk in front of the store. Mrs. Peel’s face fell. “Jennie didn’t come!” she exclaimed. “Whatever shall I do? I ought to be starting for the station this very instant. I suppose she’s coming on the next train, but I can’t wait for her. I do think she might have come when I told her, after all the things I’ve done for that girl! But that’s the way of human nature, I suppose! Bennie Hooper, didn’t you see anything of her?” “No’m,” answered the boy. “You sure she didn’t get off and you didn’t see her?” “Didn’t nobody get off,” answered Benny resentfully. “Well--” Mrs. Peel’s eyes wavered back and forth from the clock to the buggy. “I suppose I’ll just have to shut up the store and leave the key with Martha Hooper. Mrs. Benson was coming in for some onions, but I suppose she’ll have to wait.” “When does the next train come?” asked Harry solicitously. “About six. She’s bound to come on that, but--” “Then you let us watch the store until she comes,” cried Harry. “We’ll be very careful, Mrs. Peel. That is, if you think you’d care to trust us?” Mrs. Peel’s face had lighted at once. “You--you wouldn’t mind?” she faltered anxiously. “Jennie’s bound to come on the six o’clock train and I’ll have Bennie wait over there and bring her back. She ought to be here by half-past six. It’s a good deal to ask, especially as you’re strangers to me.” “We’ll be glad to,” answered Harry promptly. “Won’t we, Chub?” Chub agreed readily. “Well, I don’t know how to thank you,” fluttered Mrs. Peel. “I just don’t, and that’s a fact. But I’m going to take you at your word. All you’ll have to do is to stay here until she comes and tell her everything’s marked with the price, and that I’ll be back just as soon as I can and will write to-morrow and tell her how Millie is. Now I’ll get my things. You turn that buggy around, Bennie; you know I don’t like to be in it when it’s turned.”