Kit's profile tilted ever so slightly heavenward. Jean had loved to quote to her in the old days that consistency was a jewel, and William of Avon had said so positively, whereupon Kit would swing always, feeling herself backed by Emerson's opinion that "consistency was a hobgoblin of little minds." Yet now she felt herself feeling almost righteously consistent. She had thoroughly made up her mind that very day when Mr. Hicks made his memorable and fruitless journey to Greenacres that not even government experts had any right to climb over fences into people's private property without first asking permission. Perhaps the sudden popularity of the trespasser with all the other members of the family had something to do with Kit's stand against him. Even Helen had remarked that she didn't see how on earth Kit could ever have imagined a person looking like Mr. Howard could be a berry hooker. "I don't want you to forgive me," she said, calmly. "I've never been one bit sorry for it. I think you ought to have come up to the house and asked permission to go in there. And you never said that you were sorry. It always seemed to me as if you rather acted as if you thought it was a good joke"--she hesitated a moment, before adding pointedly,--"on me." "Suppose I apologize now." Stanley's tone was absolutely serious, but Kit, with one quick look at the precipitous path, ahead of them, laughed. "Not here, please. Wait until we hit the level shore. You do really have to pay attention on this path, or you miss your footing and toboggan all at once." "Then, suppose," he persisted, "we just consider that I have apologized. And if you accept, you can raise your right hand at me." Kit immediately raised her left one, and waggled it provocatively over her shoulder. Before he could say any more, she had hurried ahead and caught up with the rest. CHAPTER XIX THE COURT OF APPEAL It was not until after they had gone, when Kit was by herself, that she remembered all Billie had told her, at the very last of his stay. They had walked along the lake shore together, a little behind the others, after the Beaubien family had been visited. "You haven't told me anything at all," Kit said, "about home. When were you in Gilead last?" "Just before we came west," Billie answered. "Was everything all right?" Billie hesitated. "Oh, for heaven's sake, Billie, tell me if there is anything. You can't give me any nervous shocks at all, and I'm dying to find an excuse to get back home." "Why, there isn't anything the matter, exactly," Billie said, cheerfully, but with a certain reservation in his tone, that made Kit long to get him with a good grip in his curly hair and shake him the way she used to do two years ago. "The only thing that I know about, I heard grandfather telling Uncle Jerry. I don't suppose I ought to repeat it either." "Billie, I wish I could shake you right here by the Michigander sea. How dare you keep back any news of my family from me?"