"I told you, Alice, you'd better put your riding habit in your satchel. I suppose the horses are gentle, Frank." "Oh, they don't often throw anyone that's used to them. Naturally, they're a little gayer in summer when they're in the pasture so much." Ernest could not resist adding his bit. "I was thrown three times last week, would you like to try my pony, Katy?" This revealed the game to Alice. "You awful fibbers, don't you believe a word they say, girls." "Honest Injun," said Ernest, "I was." "It's the truth," Frank confirmed. Poor little Gertie, who was already beginning to realize that she was very far from home and in a strange land besides, commenced to cry. Dr. Morton came promptly to the rescue. "That'll do, boys. Save your joking till our guests are rested from their journey at least. Frank, you and Dick look up the trunks while Ernest and Sherm help me bring up the wagons. It's all right, dear," he put his arm reassuringly around Gertie, "you shall ride in one of the most comfortable of vehicles if we haven't a carriage to offer you. You mustn't pay any attention to their teasing." After the first two miles of their homeward journey, Chicken Little gave up her pony to Sherm and climbed in with the girls. Ernest offered to change saddles, but Sherm declared he didn't mind the side saddle and cheerfully bore all the jokes the party cut at his expense. Dr. Morton watched him approvingly. "Good stuff," he said to himself, as Sherm returned the sallies without wincing. The boy's long legs dangling from the side saddle were a comical sight. Sherm, if not quite so tall as Ernest, was rather better proportioned and delightfully supple and muscular. He was the same matter-of-fact, straight-forward boy he had always been, but his father's long illness had sobered him, though he could be hilarious, as he was proving now. "Say, Sherm," Katy prodded, "why don't you borrow Jane's riding skirt too?" "Yes, Sherm, go the lengths--you'd make a beautiful girl," teased Alice. Sherm laughed. "Chicken Little may have something to say to that!" "I thought you'd be making excuses." Sherm was not to be bluffed. "Not much, hand it over, Chicken Little." "You never can get into it, Sherm." "What'll you bet?" "It'll be too small around the waist." Dr. Morton stopped and Jane hastily slipped off the skirt, presenting rather a funny appearance herself with her habit basque and the blue lawn dress showing beneath. Sherm dismounted, turning Calico over to Ernest to hold. The entire party shouted when Jane reached up on tiptoe to throw the clumsy skirt over his head. Sherm neglected to hold it, and the shot in the hem promptly dropped it to the ground. "Gee," exclaimed Sherm, "the cranky thing seems to have a mind of its own." "I don't know what the girls want to wear the pesky things for," grumbled Ernest. "They don't want to wear them--but their pernickety brothers and fathers and husbands consider them modest," Alice hit back promptly.