FRIENDSHIP VILLAGE LOVE STORIES BY ZONA GALE AUTHOR OF "FRIENDSHIP VILLAGE," "THE LOVES OF PELLEAS AND ETARRE," ETC. NEW YORK GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. Set up and electrotyped. Published November, 1909. Reprinted November, 1909; April, 1912. _Norwood Press J. S. Cushing Co.--Berwick & Smith Co. Norwood, Mass., U.S.A._ To MY FRIENDS IN PORTAGE WISCONSIN Certain of the following chapters have appeared in _Everybody's_, _The American Magazine_, _The Outlook_, _The Woman's Home Companion_, and _The Delineator_. Thanks are due to the editors for their courteous permission to reprint these chapters, and to Messrs. Harper Brothers for permission to reprint the sonnet in Chapter XI. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. OPEN ARMS 1 II. INSIDE JUNE 15 III. MIGGY 33 IV. SPLENDOUR TOWN 43 V. DIFFERENT 62 VI. THE FOND FORENOON 81 VII. AFRAID 96 VIII. THE JAVA ENTERTAINMENT 116 IX. THE COLD SHOULDER 136 X. EVENING DRESS 148 XI. UNDERN 176 XII. THE WAY THE WORLD IS 191 XIII. HOUSEHOLDRY 206 XIV. POSTMARKS 223 XV. PETER 248 XVI. THE NEW VILLAGE 258 XVII. ADOPTION 274 XVIII. AT PETER'S HOUSE 293 XIX. THE CUSTODIAN 309 Friendship Village Love Stories I OPEN ARMS Although it is June, the Little Child about whom I shall sometimes write in these pages this morning brought me a few violets. June violets. They sound unconvincing and even sentimental. However, here they are in their vase; and they are all white but one. "Only one blue one," said Little Child, regretfully; "May must be 'most dead by mistake." "Don't the months die as soon as they go away?" I asked her, and a little shocked line troubled her forehead. "Oh, no," she said; "they never die at all. They wait and show the next months how."