"Well, you'd better let me out anyway," Tom suggested. "I don't want to meet anybody to-night. You rustle along, and I'll wait here." He jumped out, and Janet hurried to the barn, where the hired man was waiting to unhitch Clinker. Mrs. Blake came out on to the back porch. "Is that you, Janet?" she called. "Yes, Mrs. Blake, I was a little delayed in getting home. I hope you haven't been worried," Janet replied. "Only a little uneasy," Mrs. Blake confessed; "won't you come in and see the girls?" "Oh, not to-night, thank you. I must really hurry home." Janet spoke with so much concern that Mrs. Blake did not urge her, and after a hurried good night she was able to join Tom. "It's quite a long walk home," she apologized. "I wish I could have driven all the way. Won't you let me help you with that bag!" Tom laughed his hearty, good-natured laugh, and caught his little sister by the arm. "You little featherweight! I could carry you and the bag and never know you were there. But we'll take it easy, and that will give us more time to talk. First of all, how is grandmother?" "Oh, she's well; that is, of course, she is in bed always, but I think she feels all right otherwise," Janet replied. "Yes, of course. I was forgetting. Let me see, who else is in the house?" "Why, just Martha and me; that's all." "Any friends? Your letter sounded as though you were lonely." "I am sometimes," Janet confessed; "that is, I used to be. Lately I haven't had time because there's been Peter and Mrs. Todd." "Who's Peter?" Tom inquired. "The boy that was afraid of snakes?" "Certainly not," Janet denied hotly; "that was Harry Waters." Tom started to ask a question, thought better of it, and said instead: "How about girls?" Janet did not reply at once. Her own mind was far from made up on the subject, and it was difficult to answer Tom. "I don't know any girls, really," she replied slowly. "The ones I have met didn't like me much, and I didn't like them. When I wrote that letter to you I thought I wanted a girl friend more than anything else in the world, but now I guess boys are better; anyway, they don't say mean things behind your back." "All girls are not alike, little sister of mine. There are lots of girls in the world that are just like you and you'd like them, even better than you like boys." There was a long pause, and finally Janet said: "Tom, do you remember what I said in my letter about wishing you were a sister instead of a brother?" "Even to the exact words,"--Tom laughed. "You said that I would be much more of a comfort to you as a sister. That's what made me come on at once. I wanted to prove that brothers are some use in the world." "Don't tease," Janet begged. "I only reminded you of it so that I could say I was sorry." "But you would like to have a sister too, wouldn't you?" Tom asked anxiously. "Oh, of course,"--Janet laughed. "I'd like to have one too, but not in place of you."